Command Sgt. Maj. Yigal Iluz, 56: Veteran cop was ‘larger than life’
Killed battling the Hamas invasion of Ofakim on October 7
Command Sgt. Maj. Yigal Nissim Iluz, 56, a bomb sapper in the Israel Police’s Southern District, was killed on October 7 battling the Hamas invasion of Ofakim.
Yigal, who was just a few months away from retirement, was working an overnight shift and was on his way to provide training in the Re’im area just when the attack started, and heard shortly afterward that terrorists had invaded Ofakim.
Yigal turned around and headed toward his home city. Not far from his home, he gathered with other police officers outside the house of Rachel and David Edry, who were being held captive by Hamas gunmen.
While working to secure the scene, Yigal was shot dead by a sniper who fired from the second floor. The rest of the officers took cover and none of them were killed, and Rachel and David were ultimately rescued.
He was buried in Ofakim on October 9. He is survived by his wife, Ravit, their four children, Matan, Eden, Shilat and Noam, his mother Fanny, brother Mordechai and baby grandson, Liam.
Born in Jerusalem, Yigal attended the Naval Officers Boarding School in Acre for high school and then served in the Navy, according to a municipal eulogy. In 1993 he enlisted in the Israel Police, serving for two years as a patrol officer before training as a sapper, a role he maintained for several decades.
Yigal was a huge fan of the Maccabi Haifa soccer team who loved cycling and working out, tending to his garden and most of all spending time with his family. He also volunteered as a police representative through the Jewish Agency to a Jewish community in New Jersey.
“Yigal served for 30 years in the Israel Police, he was a very smart and professional guy and he always was looking a few steps ahead,” his wife, Ravit, told a sports site. “He was killed and with that saved everyone… he wanted to protect others, that was Yigal.”
Ravit said she has worked to memorialize her husband across Ofakim with large posters and artwork: “My Yigal was larger than life. He was the best person I knew.”
His daughter, Shilat, wrote on Facebook about all the things she wanted to thank her father for.
“Thank you for raising me for 22 years to be the person that I am, thank you for helping me take the best path for me,” she wrote. “Thank you for guiding me to the decisions I made, thank you for being a listening ear, thank you for being my best advisor, thank you for keeping me strong.”
Shilat thanked her father “for feeding me with a golden spoon – but when you needed to stop and let me deal with things, you did that too. Thank you for getting up every morning and looking at me and saying, ‘Shula, there’s nothing to fear, Dad is always behind you.’ Or when I went out on a date you’d pretend you didn’t care but you’d be waiting up in the living room until I came home.”
“In short Daddy – thank you for the privilege of being your daughter, the daughter of a king,” she wrote. “And thank you for leaving an entire empire behind you.”