The event: Lufthansa plane crash in the Alps, the earthquake in Nepal
Date: 4th of Nisan, 6th of Iyar
On March 24, 2014, a plane belonging to Germanwings, a subsidiary of Lufthansa, crashed in the Alps in southern France. There were 150 passengers on board the plane, including one Jew - the late Eyal Baum. None of them survived.
The plane's co-pilot, Gunther Lubitz, who apparently suffered from depression, locked himself in the cockpit and deliberately crashed the plane, taking 149 people to their graves.
On April 25, 11:56 a.m. Nepal time, an earthquake measuring 7.8 on the Richter scale struck the South Asian country. The massive quake killed 9,000 people, including one Jew: the late Or Asraf.
In my list of events of the year, I chose to focus on these two tragic events, since they proved to me for the umpteenth time what I already knew: We are a special, different people. There is no one like us in the world.
Only we, the Jewish people, are capable of traveling to the ends of the earth, turning over stone upon stone, to bring the body of our loved one home. 'Bringing his bones to the grave of Israel' is not a recommendation for us. It is a way of life.
After the Germanwings plane crashed on the ground, we rushed our volunteers from ZAKA to the scene, who discovered that parts of the plane and bodies were scattered over an area within a five-kilometer radius.
For days we collected sacks full of body parts and bones, until finally we filled an entire hangar. Everything was ground into pieces. Until the very eve of Passover, the volunteers collected another piece, and another piece, tirelessly and with dedication.
We brought this huge quantity to the French authorities and for months they went through bag after bag. Bone after bone. Finally, Eyal Baum was identified through advanced laboratory means, and he was brought to the Jewish cemetery.
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A similar series of actions also took place in Nepal.
As soon as we heard about the missing Israeli, Or Asraf, we sent our volunteers. For hours and days, many volunteers, ours and others, searched for Or's body.
Thousands of people died in the terrible disaster in Nepal. To this day, there are many missing people from Western countries, whose finding their bodies is not considered a critical matter in their own countries.
With us - yes. We, the Jews, the Israelis, were the only delegation that made every effort under the most difficult conditions.
That's who we are. Bringing our dead to the grave is a supreme value, but there is also great joy in it, to the extent that it can be expressed this way: Only someone who stood next to Patrick, Or's father, and told him that they had found his son's body, can understand that joy - on a certain level, of course - enveloped the man. There is no joy like the release of sufficiency.
I also encounter this joy, or this moment of relief, in announcements about the discovery of the bodies of soldiers killed in IDF operations in Gaza and Lebanon.
I don't wish this on anyone, but even those who are watching from the sidelines may understand that the family has no peace of mind until they receive the news.
After breaking the news to Patrick, and after the oath, Or's father asked to meet with me for a half-hour conversation. However, the conversation lasted three full hours, during which I was 'choking' with excitement.
Following this conversation, we met for another series of meetings.
I do not take the credit for myself. I would like to draw your attention to the volunteers who leave their families, their comfortable lives, and travel to the other side of the world to find another piece, another bone, that will be a memorial to the deceased.
These volunteers don't just work in Kathmandu and the Alps, they also rescue victims from accidents that happen in our daily lives near home. Sometimes they walk around with memories and sights that won't let them go.
I often receive news about volunteers who imagined for weeks the smell of death clinging to their clothes.
I believe that this mutual guarantee, the solidarity, the love, and the care that exist only among us, the Jewish people, will stand as a beacon of truth for us in the terrible days ahead.
• Yehuda Meshi Zahav is the chairman of ZAKA
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