We are used to seeing messages like "I found tefillin," about a pair of tefillin that was forgotten on the bus yesterday morning.
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What would you say about a tallit bag that was lost about 50 years ago, during the war, and has now been found?
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This is what Elyashiv Gutman told me tonight:
""My father, a graduate of the Har Etzion Yeshiva, prayed during the Yom Kippur War at a base in the Golan Heights. In the middle of the prayer, while he was fasting, the alarm sounded and he ran to the bunker, leaving his belongings behind. After a few months, someone found my father's tefillin and returned them to him, but his tallit bag has not been found to this day...
Well, today my father suddenly received a phone call from a Jew who has had this tallit bag for about fifty years. It turns out that during the war, we recaptured this area from the Syrians. The tallit bag was inside a damaged Syrian armored personnel carrier. The Syrians found it in the field and took it. One of the Israeli commanders, Uri Atzmon, collected equipment from the Syrian armored personnel carrier that he thought was Jewish. There was also a military prayer circle, a shofar, and more.
Atzmon is a resident of Kibbutz Gan Shmuel, and every Yom Kippur they would display these items on the kibbutz, and place them on the table as inspiration, as a reminder.
It turns out that he has been looking for the owner of the bag for years and has been telling this story everywhere, but he can't find a clue. This year his son started posting statuses on the subject and circulating the information in groups, and this is what he wrote: 'Uri Atzmon, 83rd Battalion, 670th Brigade, found a bag embroidered with the letters Y.G. on the third day of the Yom Kippur War at the foot of Givat Orha. We would be happy to reach the owner. Shares are welcome.'.
Within a few shares, the circle was closed: Y.G. This is my father. Yitzhak Gutman.
It was hard for Dad to talk tonight because he was so excited, but between all the phone calls with family and old friends, he told us something beautiful: He always wondered what happened to the tallit bag – maybe it was burned, maybe it's in Syria – but he never imagined anything like this.
"He is so happy that all these years his portfolio actually played a significant role, and he was part of the kibbutzniks' Yom Kippur experience.".
