A Miraculous Escape: Soldiers Survive Against All Odds

"When I sent my son – my only son among five daughters – to fight in Gaza, I felt a great sense of pride, but also enormous fear. I knew he was fighting and risking his life there. I was terrified, constantly praying and taking on religious commitments," Dorit Hollander says, her voice trembling. Even now, half a year after the great miracle that occurred to her son and the other soldiers with him, she has trouble calming down. She remains acutely aware of the danger and the magnitude of the miracle.

(In the video: The tank that was hit. You can see the holes where the RPG entered and exited)

Miracle on the Battlefield

"It happened the day after the last Yom Kippur," Dorit shares. "I woke up in the morning and, for some reason, decided to donate a hundred books I had written to the families of soldiers in Kiryat Arba, where I live."

Dorit pauses for a moment and notes that she is not an author professionally; she is actually a kindergarten teacher who has been educating the children of Kiryat Arba for many years. "About 18 years ago, a sweet child named Chaya Mushka Attia was in my kindergarten, the daughter of Chabad emissaries in the settlement. She was an exceptionally kind-hearted child, always giving. She had a horrible accident when one day, while playing with matches, she tragically burned to death. The tragedy shook our entire community, and since I had such good memories of her, I decided to write a book about her called ‘Sweet At Heart’ – not about the tragedy, but simply about her sweetness and generosity."

Returning to her personal story, Dorit continues: "When I decided to donate the books to the families, I knew it was a significant financial expense, but it was important to me to encourage them during such a difficult time. I posted a message in a group inviting everyone to come and get a free children’s book from me. Women even started arriving, and then at that very moment, the phone rang. It was my son on the line saying, 'I’m on a helicopter heading to Shaare Zedek, we were fired upon with an RPG, but we’re okay, it was a miracle, and we were only injured by shrapnel.'"

He didn’t have time to explain further, but it was only later that Dorit understood the magnitude of the miracle: "My son was with eight other soldiers in an 'Achzarit' tank when the attackers fired an RPG at them. The missile entered the tank at exactly a 90-degree angle and exited from the other side. My son explained that if it had been at a slightly sharper angle than 90, it would have exploded inside the tank, and we don’t even want to think about the catastrophe that could have happened. Since the missile exploded only after it was out of the tank, everyone was lightly injured by shrapnel only."

Protection From Above

"When I heard about it," Dorit recounts, "I immediately wrote to the group of soldiers’ families, 'Stop everything and just say a psalm of thanks,' feeling grateful for the miracle and the many lives saved."

"Many women responded and wrote back to me: 'It’s because you decided to donate the books,' and even quoted, 'Charity saves from death,' but I understood something else – I called Chaya Mushka's parents and simply thanked them from the bottom of my heart. I told them I feel that writing the book about their daughter is a great privilege, and I am sure that the wonderful Chaya Mushka is watching over us from above, providing us with a shield of protection and security that we all need in these challenging times."