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“Our losses are too many” – Israel marks Remembrance Day 2024

Out of 1,606 deaths since last Remembrance Day, 1,550 military personnel and civilians have fallen in battle and been murdered in Israel since October 7. 

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

Remembrance Day for the Fallen of Israel’s Wars and Victims of Terrorism officially began Sunday night at 8 p.m., the first one since the Israel-Hamas war known as Swords of Iron began on October 7, 2023.

The somber memorial ceremony took place at the Western Wall in the Old City of Jerusalem.

In an unusual move, the entire front area near the ancient prayer site had been completely blocked off since early afternoon, with only the very back of the plaza open to visitors.

President Isaac Herzog spoke about the gratitude of the nation for ultimate sacrifice that 716 men and women of the IDF, police, security services and civil defense teams have made since the war began.

Over 300 of them died on the day Hamas forces invaded Gazan envelope communities and army bases in a surprise attack that included burning and raping victims to death.

In addition, a total of 834 civilians have been murdered since last Remembrance Day, all but a dozen of them in the Hamas mega-attack and as a result of rocket and anti-tank fire from both Hamas and Hezbollah in Lebanon, as the Iranian proxy has shown support this way for their terror colleagues in Gaza over the last seven months.

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Saying “Our losses are too many,” when speaking of those murdered, Herzog adjusted one of the most famous prayers of the Yom Kippur liturgy, Unetaneh Tokef.

“Who by fire and who by suffocation, who by the sword and who by a beast,” he said. “Who at the doorstep of their home, and who in armored personnel carriers, who in the warmth of their bed and who in the streets, who at a guard-post and who in the battlefield, who at a bus stop and who at a police station. Who in a car and who in an armored vehicle, who on the kibbutz pathways, who in the pastures and who at a party, who in the shopping mall and who by missiles and rockets, who in tunnels, and who in hiding.”

The president noted that this year, the siren that marks the beginning of Remembrance Day really began “at 6:29 on the morning of the terrible national disaster on October 7…and it has continued alongside us ever since.”

He also turned to “the entire world” to say that Israel “never wanted nor chose this terrible war. Not this one nor its predecessors…. But so long as our enemies seek to destroy us, we will not lay down our swords.”

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For his part, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi acknowledged his responsibility for the army’s colossal failure to respond appropriately to all the warning signals they had had, and prevent the war.

“As the commander of the Israel Defense Forces in the war, I bear responsibility for the fact that the IDF failed in its mission to protect the citizens of the State of Israel on October 7th,” he said in part. “I feel this weight on my shoulders every day.”

“I did not know all the fallen, but I will never forget them,” he added.

Turning to the bereaved families, he said, “I stand humbly in the face of your bravery to stand up to the pain, to find strength every day in the shadow of the heavy loss, and to bring new meaning into the void that has opened up.”

While the ceremony was drawing to a close, journalist Amit Segal posted online a message that one of the commanders of the armored 9th Battalion of the 401st Brigade gave to his troops who are currently fighting in Rafah.

“Each one of tonight could have been in a different place,” he said over the radio, “a more personal one. With the wife, the children, with the friend who fell in previous wars and specifically in this one. And yet we all chose differently. We chose to be here in Rafah on Remembrance Day.

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“We don’t really need a day to remember our brothers who fell. We carry them with us every moment. And specifically because of this, we are here – to tell them and the whole nation of Israel, ‘Your death was not in vain.’”

“We will not stop, we will not run away, we will not curl up nor hide like our brothers were forced to do on October 7th,” he continued. “We will bow our head but straighten our backs…. And while in Israel they will hear the noise of the siren, we will sound a completely different noise – of strength, of devotion to the mission, of friendship, of a generation that doesn’t rejoice to go to battle but truly does not fear it. Until we return security [to the country], until victory.”