It is doubtful that any president of Israel had to pay as many condolence calls during his first half year in office as Israel’s tenth president Reuven Rivlin.
The president cut short his visit to New York in order to pay condolence calls on Friday to the families of Staff-Sgt. Dor Chaim Nini in Shtulim, and Maj. Yochai Kalangel in Elazar. The two soldiers were killed last Wednesday when their patrol vehicle was hit by an anti-tank missile fired into Israel across the northern border.
During his first month in office, Rivlin traveled the length and breadth of the country visiting the families of soldiers killed in Operation Preventive Edge. He also visited wounded soldiers in hospital and went kibbutzim, moshavim, towns and cities along the Gaza Strip to inspect damage caused by missiles and to offer words of encouragement to the residents.
It was an extremely traumatic beginning for his presidency – and to some extent, it has continued.
Rivlin was greatly distressed when news of events on the northern border reached him and he immediately instructed his staff to do what they could to reschedule his flight home.
Aware that there are no words that can comfort a family grieving over the loss of a loved one, Rivlin said quite candidly to the Nini family that he had not come to offer comfort because he knew that there is no such thing and that the pain of mourning would remain for a long time to come. But he gave his assurance that neither he, nor the IDF nor the people of Israel would forget the heroism of Dor Chaim Nini.
The soldier’s mother told the president that she always knew that her son was a hero. The soldier’s father added that the young man had done everything for them. “He was our right hand.”
At the Kalangel home in Elazar, Rivlin told the family that he had already heard heart-warming descriptions of Yochai Kalangel’s leadership abilities and had no doubt of his potential to have become a great leader in the Israel Defense Forces. Rivlin spent time discussing with the family their life in Elazar and the values on which Yochai had been raised. Kalangel had been Nini’s commander.
Rivlin said to both families that after learning of the deaths of the two soldiers, he had told all the dignitaries that he met in New York about the sacrifices that Israel has endured for its security. He said that he felt as if he was an emissary on behalf of the dead soldiers in the same way as they had been emissaries for the security of the nation.