Avraham Dviri, whose son Yoni was killed while serving in Lebanon in February 1998, volunteered for reserves duty, together with his friend Zelig Mordechai. The two have spent the past three weeks at a checkpoint outside Hevron, even though they are well past the usual age for reservists. \"What brings you to serve in Hevron at your age?,\" he was asked today, and responded,
\"I didn\'t ask specifically to serve in Hevron, but I just wanted to serve in the reserves. We all know our difficult situation, and everyone has suggestions - but no one is doing anything about it. What really pushed me to volunteer was when I read about young reservists refusing to serve because of the \'non-humanitarian\' way in which they have to run checkpoints [for Arabs] - I felt that there was both a need to serve in the army and a way to conduct checkpoints in a humanitarian way... For instance, here in Hevron we put up checkpoints, and when a 75-year-old man wanted to pass in order to attend his granddaughter\'s funeral, I let him go through - but on the other hand, when it was decided that someone could not pass, we stood firmly and simply did not let him go.\"
Dviri said that he understands why activities like his do not make the headlines: \"The press likes to find the cases that really stand out, like someone who refuses to do reserves or the soldiers who hit a reporter - but the thing that will truly help us in these times is the volunteer spirit and the feeling of unity it engenders. The IDF can win, I have no doubt; but we need to have unity... I remember when I was a young reservist at the Suez Canal in 1969 during the War of Attrition, and our spirits were very low because every day someone else was killed, and suddenly we saw an older group of reservists who had come to serve with us as volunteers - this raised our spirits tremendously... I believe that in the same way, we helped the young soldiers now; in fact, when I went off duty and thanked the young soldier whom I was with, he said, \'We should be the ones thanking you!\'\" Dviri donated the pay that he received from the National Insurance Institute to the Yad LeBanim organization.
\"I didn\'t ask specifically to serve in Hevron, but I just wanted to serve in the reserves. We all know our difficult situation, and everyone has suggestions - but no one is doing anything about it. What really pushed me to volunteer was when I read about young reservists refusing to serve because of the \'non-humanitarian\' way in which they have to run checkpoints [for Arabs] - I felt that there was both a need to serve in the army and a way to conduct checkpoints in a humanitarian way... For instance, here in Hevron we put up checkpoints, and when a 75-year-old man wanted to pass in order to attend his granddaughter\'s funeral, I let him go through - but on the other hand, when it was decided that someone could not pass, we stood firmly and simply did not let him go.\"
Dviri said that he understands why activities like his do not make the headlines: \"The press likes to find the cases that really stand out, like someone who refuses to do reserves or the soldiers who hit a reporter - but the thing that will truly help us in these times is the volunteer spirit and the feeling of unity it engenders. The IDF can win, I have no doubt; but we need to have unity... I remember when I was a young reservist at the Suez Canal in 1969 during the War of Attrition, and our spirits were very low because every day someone else was killed, and suddenly we saw an older group of reservists who had come to serve with us as volunteers - this raised our spirits tremendously... I believe that in the same way, we helped the young soldiers now; in fact, when I went off duty and thanked the young soldier whom I was with, he said, \'We should be the ones thanking you!\'\" Dviri donated the pay that he received from the National Insurance Institute to the Yad LeBanim organization.