The media is a heartless and fickle lover, capable of dismissing the heartache and drama of one story over another, because of the way the winds of opinion blow this way and that, or because the scale of one story is enough to eclipse the smaller one. Those are actually two really good scenarios, relatively speaking. It would explain, for instance, why the world is looking at the tragedy that happened in France and not at the smaller tragedy that happened in Israel. It would make it seem less heartless.
Yes. A coordinated attack on three places in which over one hundred people are killed is going to trump a story in which only two people are killed in a place where terror is de rigueur, par for the course, the dues Jews pay, for living in their ancestral homeland.
And yet, it is a terrible thing that happened here in Israel and in a way, the intimate story of what happened to two, could and would grab the heart in way that the death of over one hundred anonymous people never could, if only the facts were known. If only the media chose to broadcast what happened on a late Friday afternoon on the roads of Judea to one Jewish family.
But they never would.
Which is why it falls to me to try and convey the details to you, dear Reader, and to the world, if only the world would listen for the short time it will take me to tell this story.
This is the story of the heinous double-murder of Rabbi Yaakov Litman and his 18 year-old son, Netanel. The car was filled with various members of the Litman family, seven all told. They were on their way to Metar, where their daughter Sarah’s groom to be, Ariel Biegel, the rabbi’s son, would be called to read from the Torah on his last Shabbat as a single man. Candies would be thrown at him by the joyous congregants, wishing him a long and sweet life with his bride. There would be singing, and two families getting to know each other over shared meals, and lots and lots of mazal tovs.
Ariel Biegel and Sarah Yechiya Litman at their engagement party, just a short time ago.
Ariel Biegel and Sarah Techiya Litman at their engagement party, just a short time ago.
But it was not to be.
The car was set upon by Arab terrorists who laid in wait for Jewish prey, in a car by the side of the road. The terrorists sprayed the car filled with Litmans, taking out father and son, leaving a mother and various other family members wounded and grieving.