Police Rabbinate: This is How We Identified the Bodies

Police Rabbis at Shura Base have been working day and night in order to quickly and accurately identify the massacre victims. Deputy Chief Rabbi for the Police, Chief Superintendent Boaz Giladi described the days they spend identifying the bodies and revealing painful stories about the massacre victims.

“On the morning of Simchat Torah, I received a message asking me to come quickly to the base. I came there and my eyes went dark. The first trucks came with many bodies of murder victims to the base in order that we start the so painful process of identification.”

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Rabbi Giladi at Shura base. (Source: Israel Police Spokesperson)

“I open the bags, see the bodies and know so many of them personally. I was with them under the huppah, I saw them while serving, and other places. The murdered lay silent now. They fought, fell, and were murdered, and with them the soul of relatives was murdered,” Rabbi Giladi said with pain.

“In all this hell, I knew we had one mission,” Rabbi Giladi continued. “The Rabbis of the police and the security forces and the volunteers – we all shared one big mission – to arrive at identification as fast as possible, to brings the holy ones to burial and to remove the doubts and the lack of knowledge.”

One of the most heart-rending stories the Rabbi told was the long and difficult process leading to the identification of a female police officer. All of them stood around her crying their eyes out and singing “Eshet Chayil.”