Amichai Weitzen, 33: High school educator and devoted dad of 5

Israel Amichai Weitzen, 33, from Kibbutz Kerem Shalom, was slain on October 7 while defending the kibbutz from a Hamas invasion.

A member of the kibbutz’s local security team, he was posthumously recognized as a fallen soldier with the rank of master sergeant in the reserves.

Amichai and the other members of the kibbutz’s security team gathered early that morning when the rocket fire began, and split up into pairs to battle against the invasion of the Hamas terrorists of the small kibbutz, situated only around 100 meters from the Gaza border.

While fighting the terrorists, Amichai sent voice notes to his wife and five kids holed up in their reinforced room, telling them that everything was under control and urging them to try to still find joy in the Simhat Torah holiday, but “definitely, definitely don’t look out the window… there are things they shouldn’t see.”

In the ensuing gun battles, Amichai was slain alongside his friend and fellow local security team member Yedidya Raziel, after eliminating terrorists who had holed up inside a family home. The rest of the kibbutz was saved and later evacuated alive, though two were seriously wounded.

Amichai was buried on October 11 on Jerusalem’s Mount Herzl. He is survived by his wife, Talia, their five children, Tzur, Kerem, Ori, Ruth and Shahar, his parents, Rachel and Shlomo Yosef, and his seven siblings, Eicha, Tzvi, Tal, Elyashiv, Reut, Emuna and Yaakov.

Born and raised in the West Bank settlement of Psagot, he studied in the Alon Moreh hesder yeshiva and in the Har Hamor yeshiva before enlisting in the IDF, serving in the Golani Brigade. During his service he met and married his wife, Talia, and they lived in Jerusalem, then Ashkelon, before arriving in Kerem Shalom in 2017 as part of a project of religious Zionist emissaries to help shore up the struggling kibbutz.

Amichai studied social work and worked most recently as a counselor at a local agricultural high school, where he was able to combine his passions for social work and education.

“He was an educator, he was an incredible character in and of himself,” his mother, Rachel, said in an interview. “A family man, devoted, always carrying one or two of his kids… He was a hero, not in a physical sense, he wasn’t very muscular. He was a hero in his deeds, in the way he lived his life.”

Rachel said that Amichai was devoted to Torah study, even when working full time he always made sure he had a day off to devote to learning in yeshiva, “because he said that the Torah recharged him, he had to connect to it once a week… He would study in the morning in yeshiva with his brother as preparation to come to us at night and study with my husband, a rabbi and yeshiva head, and then get home after midnight. That’s a hero in my eyes — he lived as a hero and died heroically.”

Amichai’s wife, Talia, told the Davar news outlet that Amichai “loved this land, he loved the Torah, he loved the kids. He was a man of spirit and light.”

He spent his life moving between education and social work, “and then he went to be a counselor at an agricultural high school, which was perfect for him. I saw his students after he was killed, and they feel like orphans.”

Talia said she speaks with her children all the time about their father’s memory: “When I think about what he would have wanted, I know that he would want me to be happy and to live and to enjoy and to take life by storm… His presence is more tangible in our joy.”

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