Damaged memorial
Photo courtesy of the family
Memorial to IDF friendly fire victims vandalized for third time
An olive tree and memorial plaque for Yoav Doron and Yehud Ben Yosef, two IDF soldiers killed in 2003, was found defaced by their families in their weekly trip to pray at the site.
A memorial in southern Mount Hebron for IDF fallen soldiers 2nd Lt. Yoav Doron and Staff Sgt. Yehuda Ben Yosef was vandalized overnight Thursday.
The families of the two victims, who were both accidentally shot dead in a friendly fire exchange during the Second Intifada when IDF forces mistook them for terrorists, discovered the desecrated memorial on Friday morning during their customary weekly visit to the site. The vandals had set fire to the olive tree planted in their honor and damaged the memorial plaque itself.
The damaged memorial (Photo provided by the family)
Ben Yosef had already been discharged from the military and worked guarding a military antenna installed on a hill adjacent to Ma'ale Hever in Mount Hebron. Doron, who had finished the officers' training course and was on furlough before beginning his new position, had passed the night guarding with his friend.
Yoav Doron and Yehuda Ben Yosef (Photo courtesy of the family)
On March 13, 2003, the date of the incident, an IDF Maglan force identified the two as terrorists and fired on them from a helicopter, killing them both. The fallen soldiers' families and friends erected a memorial at the place, with the assistance of the Mount Hebron Regional council, which was inaugurated in 2004.
The damaged olive tree (Photo provided by the family)
The memorial was already vandalized twice in 2012.
Family members praying at the memorial (Photo provided by the family)
Doron's mother, Esther, told Ynet, "They've committed a pogrom against us. I wasn't surprised by it." She continued to say that "if a Jew had uprooted an olive tree, everyone would have been called" to the scene.
She insisted that the IDF, though busy, "should patrol the memorial regularly and not give up, and look for (the perpetrators" and punish them.
