Soldier who posed with bound Palestinians injured by rocket
Eden Abergil, who grabbed international headlines by posing with blindfolded prisoners in 2010, lightly hurt by Grad
Stuart Winer is a breaking news editor at The Times of Israel.
A woman who gained notoriety during her army service after she posted pictures on the Internet of herself mocking bound and blindfolded Palestinians, was lightly injured by a Grad rocket that hit near Ashdod last week.
Eden Abergil was hit by shrapnel from the rocket and underwent minor surgery before being released from the hospital, Ynet reported.
The attack happened on Friday night as Abergil was traveling from her home in Gan Yavneh to Ashdod.
“We stopped at a junction, at a traffic light, in our car,” she recalled. “Next to us was another car. I heard sirens and wanted to get out, but the guy with me in the car told me there was no siren and closed the door — he wouldn’t let me out. When he closed the door, there was a huge blast.”
The rocket hit the adjacent vehicle, seriously injuring off-duty soldier Natanel Maman, a soldier who had fought in the Gaza Strip. Maman has remained hospitalized in critical condition after undergoing surgery to remove shrapnel from his skull.
“Everyone in cars around us got out of their cars [before the rocket hit, as per the Home Front Command’s instructions] except for the guy who was wounded. He stayed in the car,” she said. “If he had come out, he would have saved himself. And if I had come out, I would have been more seriously injured.”
Following the incident, Abergil posted an update on her Facebook page.
“I was lightly injured from fragments in the face, body, and mostly an ear. It looks like I will have a small operation.”
Abergil also posted a defiant message to terrorists in the Gaza Strip, who have kept up incessant rocket fire on Israel throughout the IDF’s Operation Protective Edge.
“We are proud Jews!” she wrote. “We are a people who have divine providence. It won’t help you — we’ll be injured, we’ll die, we’ll have some scratches, but you are not the ones who will stop us from living our lives as usual here.”
The ongoing Operation Protective Edge, which launched on July 8, aims to halt the rocket fire and also destroyed a network of tunnels, dug by Hamas under the border with Israel, and used to launch terror attacks.
Abergil’s 2010 photo scandal provoked outrage around the world. Following the incident, the IDF said it would crack down on soldiers posting offensive and humiliating photos on social-network sites.
