After undergoing months of total despair and sorrow, Rafi's son appeared to him in a dream - and he then resolved to open a website featuring happy and positive stories. The name of the website is Raktov.com, translated into English as "www.good-only.com".
"Until you experience something like your son dying, you cannot understand to what depths you can fall," Rafi said. "My son's death totally shattered me. I had nightmares every night." But one night, several months ago, everything changed.
"My son Guy appeared to me in a dream," Rafi told HaTzofeh's Yaffa Goldstein. "He was calm and serene like he never was in his lifetime. He hugged me and showed me a heart, on one side of which was written rak [only], and on the other was written tov [good]. I understood that he was giving me a message and that I had to act accordingly. The next morning I started the website."
The site is as its name implies - only good stories, "an answer to the violence, treachery, and corruption we always read about. It's no wonder that the youth, exposed to such terrible things, like to close themselves up, and that sometimes those of them who are more sensitive and deep are willing to give up everything."
Rafi turned down an offer from Microsoft Israel to partner with the "Good-Only" site, saying, "My purpose is to eternalize my son, and it can't be commercialized or polluted by those types of ads."
Rafi Sofer is a frequent guest at schools, where he tells the students that every problem can be turned into a challenge. "I also try to have them recognize the source of the tensions they might be feeling," he told Arutz-7, "and this can be a way of dealing with them. " He also volunteers for the "Meir Panim - Power to Give" Organization, and has also refurbished - on his own time - some 300 computers for students all over the country.
But of all his endeavors, it appears that the one that gives him the most satisfaction is meeting people and bringing out the good in them. He says that the purpose of the site is to "encourage people, especially youth and children, to publicize stories of good deeds."
One story on the site is of two 60-year-old cousins who happily discovered each other for the first time by virtue of a photograph of their mutual grandmother displayed in a hospital exhibit. The nurse who established the exhibit wrote,
"I established a gallery in the hospital to make it easier for patients who sometimes have to wait a long time, and to benefit the hospital staff. The gallery gives them a chance to show their artistic side, and to tighten the bonds between the staff and the patients... You can never know what good can come out of an act that was done for positive reasons!"
One 10-year-old boy tells, in less than perfect Hebrew, that he and his brother take turns sleeping at their widowed grandmother's home "so that she won't be alone."
Another story, written by a mother of a six-year-old son, ends with the words, "I just know that for me, not everything about the eviction from Gush Katif was negative."
The story, in short:
"Two years ago, our family was in a bad car accident, which ended miraculously without deaths. But ever since the accident, our small son David tended to go off by himself for hours at a time and spend time talking or singing quietly to a favorite toy or book; no treatment helped...
"During the Disengagement, we went to protest against the soldiers who were willing to carry out what we believed were inhumane and illegal orders to throw people out of their homes. We talked and yelled at them, and David even joined in as well, but they stood there like bricks in a strong wall. I was speaking to one of the soldiers, who faced me stoically with his black uniform and seemed to be just barely holding himself back from answering and even agreeing with me. Suddenly, I realized that my greatest fear had come true: My David had disappeared!
"I went into shock, and started running all over looking for him, yelling out his name, dashing in every direction amidst the throngs of people - but to no avail. I finally sat down on the ground and started crying. Meanwhile, the soldiers were replaced by others, but my David was still nowhere to be found. Suddenly, I felt a hush all around me. I looked up and saw 'my' soldier, the one I had been talking to, striding towards me, and the noisy crowd around me splitting in two like the Red Sea to let him through, with him holding my little David's hand.
"How did this soldier find my son? How did he find me amongst the large crowd of people? How did he manage to hold David's hand, who just a few hours before had been yelling at him and viewed him as his sworn enemy? But mainly - what did he do to calm David down so totally? The soldier placed my son's hand in mine, and then turned around quietly and went back to take his place in line.
"But most astonishing of all: Though we continue to experience the trauma of the expulsion, our household is like new. David no longer disappears! He sits and talks with us, and plays with his friends as well. What did this 'wall-like' soldier do that psychologists were unable to do for two years? All I know is that for us, not everything about the expulsion was negative!!"
Rafi Sofer sums up: "I think that if I sit with the youth, talk to them and give them a tool by which to emphasize the good, this will help them to be less pressured and tense. Maybe I'm naive, but if my talks and efforts to uncover the good prevent just one act of suicide, I will be happy."
"Until you experience something like your son dying, you cannot understand to what depths you can fall," Rafi said. "My son's death totally shattered me. I had nightmares every night." But one night, several months ago, everything changed.
"My son Guy appeared to me in a dream," Rafi told HaTzofeh's Yaffa Goldstein. "He was calm and serene like he never was in his lifetime. He hugged me and showed me a heart, on one side of which was written rak [only], and on the other was written tov [good]. I understood that he was giving me a message and that I had to act accordingly. The next morning I started the website."
The site is as its name implies - only good stories, "an answer to the violence, treachery, and corruption we always read about. It's no wonder that the youth, exposed to such terrible things, like to close themselves up, and that sometimes those of them who are more sensitive and deep are willing to give up everything."
Rafi turned down an offer from Microsoft Israel to partner with the "Good-Only" site, saying, "My purpose is to eternalize my son, and it can't be commercialized or polluted by those types of ads."
Rafi Sofer is a frequent guest at schools, where he tells the students that every problem can be turned into a challenge. "I also try to have them recognize the source of the tensions they might be feeling," he told Arutz-7, "and this can be a way of dealing with them. " He also volunteers for the "Meir Panim - Power to Give" Organization, and has also refurbished - on his own time - some 300 computers for students all over the country.
But of all his endeavors, it appears that the one that gives him the most satisfaction is meeting people and bringing out the good in them. He says that the purpose of the site is to "encourage people, especially youth and children, to publicize stories of good deeds."
One story on the site is of two 60-year-old cousins who happily discovered each other for the first time by virtue of a photograph of their mutual grandmother displayed in a hospital exhibit. The nurse who established the exhibit wrote,
"I established a gallery in the hospital to make it easier for patients who sometimes have to wait a long time, and to benefit the hospital staff. The gallery gives them a chance to show their artistic side, and to tighten the bonds between the staff and the patients... You can never know what good can come out of an act that was done for positive reasons!"
One 10-year-old boy tells, in less than perfect Hebrew, that he and his brother take turns sleeping at their widowed grandmother's home "so that she won't be alone."
Another story, written by a mother of a six-year-old son, ends with the words, "I just know that for me, not everything about the eviction from Gush Katif was negative."
The story, in short:
"Two years ago, our family was in a bad car accident, which ended miraculously without deaths. But ever since the accident, our small son David tended to go off by himself for hours at a time and spend time talking or singing quietly to a favorite toy or book; no treatment helped...
"During the Disengagement, we went to protest against the soldiers who were willing to carry out what we believed were inhumane and illegal orders to throw people out of their homes. We talked and yelled at them, and David even joined in as well, but they stood there like bricks in a strong wall. I was speaking to one of the soldiers, who faced me stoically with his black uniform and seemed to be just barely holding himself back from answering and even agreeing with me. Suddenly, I realized that my greatest fear had come true: My David had disappeared!
"I went into shock, and started running all over looking for him, yelling out his name, dashing in every direction amidst the throngs of people - but to no avail. I finally sat down on the ground and started crying. Meanwhile, the soldiers were replaced by others, but my David was still nowhere to be found. Suddenly, I felt a hush all around me. I looked up and saw 'my' soldier, the one I had been talking to, striding towards me, and the noisy crowd around me splitting in two like the Red Sea to let him through, with him holding my little David's hand.
"How did this soldier find my son? How did he find me amongst the large crowd of people? How did he manage to hold David's hand, who just a few hours before had been yelling at him and viewed him as his sworn enemy? But mainly - what did he do to calm David down so totally? The soldier placed my son's hand in mine, and then turned around quietly and went back to take his place in line.
"But most astonishing of all: Though we continue to experience the trauma of the expulsion, our household is like new. David no longer disappears! He sits and talks with us, and plays with his friends as well. What did this 'wall-like' soldier do that psychologists were unable to do for two years? All I know is that for us, not everything about the expulsion was negative!!"
Rafi Sofer sums up: "I think that if I sit with the youth, talk to them and give them a tool by which to emphasize the good, this will help them to be less pressured and tense. Maybe I'm naive, but if my talks and efforts to uncover the good prevent just one act of suicide, I will be happy."