Mossad chief Dedi Barnea's secret weapon is his Breslover brother Zohar

Photos: Elchanan Kotler, Mishpacha archives

When Naomi Barnea gave birth to her second son in 1971, the country's landscape was filled with Lag B'omer fires.

And so, she decided to give him the name “Zohar,” in honor of the holy kabbalistic foundational work revealed on Lag B’omer by Rabi Shimon bar Yochai. More than 50 years later, Lag B’omer was still a momentous day for Rabbi Zohar Barnea, but this time the circumstances were like nothing he could have imagined.

Zohar Barnea is the brother of David (Dedi) Barnea, the clever, brave, and daring Mossad operative who was appointed to head the international secret service organization last June. Lag B’omer last year was just a few weeks before the appointment, and Dedi asked his chareidi Breslover brother to pray for his success at the tziyun of Rabi Shimon bar Yochai.

Those prayers were not only answered when Dedi was appointed Mossad chief, but that very night, when Zohar Barnea and his 14-year-old son found themselves on the “staircase of death,” where 45 people lost their lives in Meron on Lab B’omer night. Reb Zohar and his son were spared, but the long moments during which he battled to save the lives of those around him, and the horrific scenes that he witnessed in the process, have left him traumatized nearly a year later.

But Zohar Barnea has been through a lot in his life, and he knows how time, and the accompanying spiritual work, can help the nefesh heal. He’s traveled his own journey, always aware, he says, that Hashem has constantly been holding him up. Why should this challenge be any different, he asks?

“There was a very secular atmosphere in the home I grew up in,” Rabbi Barnea tells Mishpacha, “but in the background, there were deep roots of emunah.” His grandfather, Reb Yehuda Brunner a”h, fled with his young family from Germany and settled in Bnei Brak, where he became an important public figure. His grandmother was related to the Belzer Rebbe and her brother Hy”d was a rav in Dzikov, who refused to abandon his community during World War II, even though he was offered a safe hideaway.

Yosef Brunner (Barnea), Zohar and Dedi’s father, was three years old when the family came to Eretz Yisrael. Yosef learned in the Hapoel Hamizrachi yeshivah in Bnei Brak, but, swept up by the spirit of the times, enlisted in the Palmach when he was 16 and fought in the War of Independence. He eventually reached the rank of lieutenant colonel in the Air Force, where he also began to work on technological developments. When his service was over, he went into the private sector working for Tadiran, although his technical know-how kept him a valuable asset for the military, and he was enlisted for weapons acquisitions.

“We grew up in a home filled with idealism,” Rabbi Barnea relates. “Our parents infused us with very high values, especially with regard to the personal example that they set. My father a”h developed certain technologies for aircraft that were game changers, but we only found out about many of the awards he received after he passed away two years ago. He held top positions in his company, but we always understood that to him, money was always a means and not an end in itself. On the other hand, he wasn’t cowed by anyone. Even when he had to mingle with very wealthy and powerful people, both in Israel and abroad, he never allowed prestige to confuse or sway him, and if he knew something was right, nothing could pressure him. I think that in a certain sense, my brother Dedi and I inherited this trait. It explains some of the independent and less conventional steps we chose to make in our lives — each one in his way.”

One of those steps was mitzvah observance. In 1983, when Zohar was 12, Yosef Barnea was sent to conduct negotiations with the US military, and the family moved to New York for a few years. Zohar was enrolled in the Modern Orthodox Ramaz school, and following a preparation course for his bar mitzvah, he decided to continue observing the mitzvos he’d learned about even after his 13th birthday.

“To me, it seemed like the most natural thing to do,” he says, although he didn’t want to upset his parents and so he pretty much kept under the radar. They realized how serious he was two years later when they were traveling back to Israel and Zohar was scanning the aisles looking for a minyan for Minchah.

“It was really remarkable, because I continued on in a very secular environment,” Rabbi Barnea relates. “But from the minute I began to observe mitzvos, I never considered stopping.” Even after returning to Israel, enrolling in a paramilitary boarding school, and joining the IDF’s Golani unit.