After the terror shooting attack near Otniel in which Rabbi Yaakov and his son Netanel Litman Hy"d (may G-d avenge their blood) were murdered, Dafna Meir of the community of Otniel, located in the Hevron hills, wrote a personal column for the community's newsletter.
Dafna, Hy"d, who wrote of her worries concerning the shaky security situation, was stabbed in the doorway of her home by an Arab terrorist Sunday night. She fought the murderer and shouted for help, preventing him from reaching her children, some of whom were at home. A nurse at Be'er Sheva's Soroka Hospital, where the number of Arabs treated equals or surpasses that of Jews, Dafna and her husband were raising six children, two of them foster children. Her funeral will take place on Monday morning.
"Lately, I cannot help mulling over the security situation," she wrote, "thoughts about what, why, what must be done, what should not be done. Or cannot be done. Or is not worth doing. How to act. Especially on the road, but not only there. About the fears. For my husband and the children. Friends and family. Lots of things. The situation is not easy. Sometimes I feel like it is a game of Russian Roulette. And sometimes I cannot sleep."
She wrote of her appreciation for the volunteers in the community's security patrol. "When I walk the streets of Otniel, I sometimes have the opportunity to greet my [medical] colleagues, who have elected to give up their free hours and serve on the emergency squad in our community and its environs."
"These people carry various types of communications equipment with them twenty four hours a day, weekdays and Shabbat. They are the first to hear about everything that happens and in cases [where they are needed], they jump onto the special vehicle we call an ambulance and race to the site of incidents to save whomever they can. Even in the middle of a shower, or while enjoying their Shabbat meal. I wonder, do they sleep with their boots on? Who knows?"
She expressed her personal feelings, writing, "Lately, there have been a good many calls that did not bring good news. I am afraid that not all emergency calls mean that someone is giving birth. What can one do? And if it is a birth, sometimes it is a Palestinian Arab woman. After what we saw of the Red Crescent last Friday [when the Arab Red Cross ambulance that reached the murder scene first did not stop to aid the Litmans] the desire to help them is not exactly a burning one. I am familiar with that feeling. I get it myself once in a while."
"Still, the community's emergency rescue unit goes out to the danger areas. Isn't it possible that those spots are traps? It's really frightening! And when they go out to help, in the first few moments perhaps they have time to wonder about whom they will meet this time. 'Maybe a neighbor, a friend, my wife?' It is a terrible reality we live in," wrote Dafna Meir, not long ago.
Now her voice has been stilled by a barbarian's knife. And her children will never feel their mother's hugs again.