Hila Barbitz is a midwife who lives on Kibbutz Sa'ad, and she sent me a small but mighty story: "Thursday evening, in the middle of cooking for Shabbat, the phone rings. It's Tzvika Rider, our neighbor and a senior paramedic. 'I've got a call for a woman in labor,' he tells me. Thirty seconds later I'm already in his new ambulance, which was donated in memory of his son Dor, who was murdered in Be'eri on Simchat Torah (October 7th 2023).
We start driving toward the entrance to Be'eri, out by the fields. On the way, Tzvika says: 'How I wish there'd be a birth here, in Dor's ambulance. This is my first call with this vehicle.'
On the road to Be'eri, across from Kibbutz Alumim, Tzvika spots the car that called us, pulled over on the side of the road. We get out and see a woman leaning against the trunk, two little kids inside, and a husband who is very, very (!) happy to see us...
I hurry over. The woman is already fully in labor. Tzvika rushes to pull out a stretcher to get her into the ambulance. We climb in, and within seconds she gives birth to a beautiful baby boy, amazing. We're all overwhelmed with emotion. I hold on tight so I won't cry.
With perfect timing, an intensive care ambulance arrives and takes her, beaming, to the maternity ward.
On the way back, I think about the project called 'Poteḥot Tzir' ('Opening the Way’ but also a play on words with the Hebrew term for contraction), which partners the midwives' organization with Magen David Adom precisely for cases like this. Thank God that because of this project, I was there. People always say about a new ambulance, 'May it be used for births.' And here we were blessed to see it happen.
And then I think about Dor Rider of blessed memory, Tzvika's son who was murdered in Be'eri. An ambulance dedicated in his name, and its very first call is for a baby boy, born right on the road to Be'eri. And the brit, God willing, will fall right on the eve of Simchat Torah.
And now the tears won't stop. I cry for dear Dor, for my friend Adrienne, the beloved midwife who was murdered in Be'eri, and for the mother I helped bring new life into the world.
I head back home, to the cook for Shabbat.
’And I said to you: In your blood, live; and I said to you: In your blood, live’”(Ezekiel 16:6).
