A letter to my son, Hadar Goldin
Goldin was killed during Israel's last conflict with Hamas this summer in one of the darkest and bloodiest events of the war, now his mother remembers him for the man he was, not just the fighter he is remembered as – and asks Israel to work to return his body from Gaza.
"When you do something good, try to think about how you can do it better" – that is how Hadar Goldin's friends, schoolmates and fellow fighters from the army quoted him as saying.
My dearest Hadar, Second Lieutenant Hadar Goldin, the commander of a Givati Brigade combat unit, led by example: Top of his crew during his training, honorary cadet in his patrol and intelligence course, top of his class in his battalion commander's courses, top of his officer's course and the top officer in Givati. In addition to all these, the unit he trained was top of their cadet course and combat training.
What Hadar asked of others - he demanded of himself. His soldiers said of him: "He demanded we constantly improve and strive towards excellence. He never gave up and always pushed us further and further, improving and encouraging us, without ever losing his sharp sense of humor, glowing smile and sense of leadership by personal example."
"He once called me a cry baby," one of his soldiers recalled. "He was right, I was a cry baby. But then, out of nowhere, during morning roll call he came up to me and apologized in front of everyone. I was shocked." It was probably the first time in military history that during a training course a commander apologizes to a cadet for calling him a name. Far from loosing face, it boosted the respect the soldiers had for him.
My son, 2nd.-Lt. Hadar Goldin, was kidnapped and killed by Hamas during a ceasefire in Operation Protective Edge, and we expect Israel and the IDF to bring him back. His phone ringtone was Eretz Tzvi (Land of the Deer) – it tells the tale of how Israel brought the kidnapped from Entebbe back to Israel, and Yonni Netanyahu (the prime minister's older brother) was killed in the operation. Hadar left us a message with that ringtone: "To a nation who will not go silent / Who will not abandon its sons":
At midnight they arose
and struck at the edge of the world
Like sons of ghosts they hurried to take flight
To return the honor of humanity
To eretz tzvi (the land of the deer - Israel)
To the honey of her fields
To the Carmel
And the desert
To a nation who will not go silent
Who will not abandon its sons
To eretz tzvi, in whose mountains
A city beats from generation to generation
To the motherland to whose navel
Her children are bound in good and in bad
At midnight passes
In our fields a blistering wind
A willow then bows her head
For those who with the dawn did not come back
To eretz tzvi
To the honey of her fields
To the Carmel
And the desert
To eretz tzvi, whose tears
Fall on a field of sunflowers
Whose sadness and happiness
Are crisscrossed across her dress
Hadar, with your smile, your drawings, your writings, and in the hearts of your family, cadets and soldiers you have willed us to carry the banner of the love of fellow man. Hadar didn’t allow his soldiers to curse, he busied himself helping those in need and tried to find common ground between this land's different inhabitants, so different and yet so similar to one another, religious and secular as one.
"We each have two options: Either to focus on ourselves, or to do something good," Hadar said, and this is his legacy.