“Let’s do one more time around. Who knows when we’ll ever have the opportunity to celebrate Shavuos in Gaza again?”

Over the phone, I heard the ding of the doors closing on the light rail in Yerushalayim. “Where are you going?” I asked my son Meir.

“Har Herzl.”

My heart skipped a beat.

It was Sunday, 10 Sivan/June 16, and the previous day, on Shabbos, 11 IDF kedoshim had fallen in battle.

And Har Herzl is the site of Israel’s National Military Cemetery.

“Whose levayah are you going to?” I asked.

Meir, a tour guide, told me that a good friend and colleague, Elon Weiss, was one of the 11.

“I spoke to him a few days before Shavuos. He was stationed in Gaza.”

Elon Weiss Hy”d only “moonlighted” as a tour guide. Most of his day, he taught Torah at the yeshivah in Maaleh Adumim. He loved each talmid as if he was his ben yachid, and the talmidim reciprocated with great love for their rebbi.

Elon was 49 years old, a father of seven, and a grandfather. He was the first Israeli grandfather to be killed while on active duty in Gaza.

Elon’s reserve unit was activated on Simchas Torah and sent to the Northern Front for four months before being discharged. Elon wanted to host a seudas hodayah after his return. However, it wasn’t within his budget due to his modest means.

When Meir realized this, he helped sponsor the seudah with funds from Keren Achdut. This organization, founded by, among others, Meir and his wife Malka, provides support to the families of soldiers.

Elon returned to teaching Torah. He was privileged to walk his daughter Racheli to the chuppah on Lag B’omer, and shortly, he was planning to walk another daughter to the chuppah.

However, all that changed when he heard that the 8th Reserve Armored Brigade’s 129th Battalion had been called up again and was needed in Gaza.

Elon, a tankist who never shirked his responsibility to his fellow soldiers, insisted on joining his reserve unit in Gaza, despite being eligible for exemption from military service due to his age. Elon felt that if the brigade was being called up, he needed to be with them. Such was his sense of responsibility.

On Shabbos parshas Naso, his tank was hit with an explosive device. The blast killed Elon and the tank commander.

The funeral was attended by hundreds of Jews of all types. There are no divisions at a funeral; we are all one people.

During the shivah, one of the men in his unit described how on the previous Shavuos night, when they were all exhausted after a day of fighting, Elon, although the oldest one there, woke them from their slumber.

“All of Klal Yisrael is learning Tikkun Leil Shavuos right now. Should we not join with them even though we are in Gaza?” Elon asked. Then he delivered an impromptu shiur. At the end of the shiur, before they returned to their cots, Elon grasped the hands of the other soldiers and began a spirited dance.

As the sweet niggun of “V’samachta B’chagecha” wafted through the streets of Gaza, Elon continued to encourage the sweat-drenched soldiers as he announced, “Let’s do one more time around. Who knows when we’ll ever have the opportunity to celebrate Shavuos in Gaza again?”

As the soldier concluded his story, he looked at Elon’s children. “Just know: that Tikkun Leil Shavuos and that rikkud changed our lives. We will never forget it. Your father — Elon ben Giora, Hashem yinkom damo — his love of Torah, his enthusiasm for mitzvos, and his mesirus nefesh for Klal Yisrael will live on forever. It continues to inspire me and all the other soldiers to greater levels in Torah.”

Yehi zichro baruch.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1023)