Soccer Dad

Donating organs to the enemy

I don't mean to be churlish. Really I don't.
It is wonderful that Ismail Khatib chose to donate the organs of his son Ahmed to any and all who needed them and that Mr. Khatib is proud that some of his son's organs went to Jews.
But the coverage of this heartwarning incident strikes me as cynical. Here's the Washington Post for example:

The donation, which the mechanic and his wife have described as a peace overture that others should emulate, has at least momentarily transformed a persistent conflict between two peoples into a shared drama of ordinary people looking beyond a war that Israeli human rights groups say has killed 672 Palestinian and 118 Israeli minors in the last five years.

Israel's finance minister, Ehud Olmert, called quickly to apologize for Ahmed's death and to thank the family for its decision. Members of the Israeli parliament, particularly the Arab bloc, have praised the gesture. Ismail Khatib was summoned Wednesday to meet Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, who he said told him, "What you have done serves our cause." Even the guerrillas here say the family's sacrifice has proved more potent than their armed operations.

And in what circumstances did those minors die? Ahmed, was carrying a toy rifle in a place where the Israeli army was operating. Hardly a wise decision. And even if Israel apologizes, was it wrong for the Israeli soldiers to shoot first and ask questions later?

But the bigger problem I have is what would happen if the opposite happened? If an Israeli or Jew was killed in a Palestinian terror attack whose family donated his/her organs to Palestinians, would there be hundreds of articles declaring that this act of humanity and sacrifice transformed the conflict? The answer of course is "no."

Did you ever hear of Yoni Jesner? Here's Mona Charen:

In the midst of this abomination, one story deserves more attention than it has received. It is the story of 19-year-old Jonathan (Yoni) Jesner. He was a religious Jew from Scotland who had gone to Israel to study in a Yeshiva before beginning medical school. On Friday, Sept. 20, he boarded a bus in Tel Aviv that was blown up by a homicide bomber.

Yoni was one of six who died. When doctors told the stunned family of their son's death, they asked whether they would like to donate Yoni's organs. His father later explained: "There were about 20 of the family in the hospital, and we had to consider for 10, 15 minutes. But we thought that because Yoni was going to be a doctor and he wanted to help people that the organs should be donated for humanitarian purposes. We weren't told and we didn't care whether it went to a Palestinian, an Israeli or an American, or whatever, and Yoni wouldn't have cared."

Yasmin Abu Ramila is a Palestinian 7-year-old from East Jerusalem. She has been undergoing dialysis in an Israeli hospital -- yes, an Israeli hospital -- for nearly two years. When Yoni's kidneys became available, Yasmin's name was next on the waiting list for transplants. She is doing well, and while it's too early to say whether the transplant was a complete success, she has been given a chance at life. The girl's father has said he would like to meet the Jesner family some day.

I searched a database of 9 national newspaper for articles on Yoni Jesner. I found two. In the New York Times. The main one was 'We Are One Family': A Mideast Story that appeared on page A12 on September 27, 2002.

Yoni seems to have been a remarkable young man. One who might one day have become a doctor like Dr. Shmuel Gillis.

When Dr. Gillis was killed in early 2001, I remember that the Washington Post article referred to him simply as a "settler." (I have not been able to find the article in the newspaper database.) But again I went to the database and searched for articles on Dr. Gillis. About 10 days after he died, the Boston Globe wrote what Dr. Gillis was about in HEALER IS RECENT MIDEAST VICTIM ISRAELI PHYSICIAN SLAIN DRIVING TO WEST BANK HOME:

Dr. Shmuel Gillis was on his final rounds at Hadassah University Hospital, but he did not want to leave before checking in with his friend and colleague, Dr. Hussein Aliyan.

Aliyan had asked the Boston-trained Gillis, one of Israel's top blood specialists, to assist him in treating a young leukemia patient named Rima Omar.

It was Thursday, Feb. 1, and night was falling. He would be late getting home. The week had brought a spate of nighttime killings of Jewish settlers on roads in the increasingly lawless West Bank, but if it crossed Gillis's mind that working late could put his life in danger, he never showed it, said Aliyan.

It was just after 7 p.m. by the time Gillis, 42, left the hospital for the West Bank settlement of Gush Etzion, where he lived with his wife and five young children.

He never made it.

Presumably, the gunmen who riddled his car with bullets on a road just outside a Palestinian refugee camp near Bethlehem did not know that this Jewish doctor had been working overtime with a Palestinian physician, desperately trying to treat a Palestinian woman battling an aggressive form of leukemia.

And I know from my brother that Jews and Arabs alike called the family during Shiva.

Despite the conflict there has been plenty of humanity displayed by Israelis towards the Palestinians. (And I'm not talking about the political exhibitionist like Machsom Watch.) But that rarely makes the news.

But when a gesture of such profound goodheartedness comes from the Palestinians it's a major news story. As if only the Palestinians can act this way. As if Israel needs forgiveness from the Palestinians, but not the other way around.
(To be updated...)

UPDATE: I am not complaining about Ismail Khatib's actions or declarations, which are noble and above reproach. I was careful to state that my discomfort was with the coverage. It seems to me that the coverage has used the Khatib family's tragedy as another stick with which to club Israel.

Incidentally, what got me started here was memory of 2 similar events in the mid to late 80's. A Jew died and his organs were donated to Arabs. About the same time an Arab died and his family refused to donate to Jews. I was unable to find references to those incidents though.

Thanks to SerAndEz and Boker Tov Boulder for the mention.

In the AP version there was another element of the coverage of the story at AP that bothered me:

Israel has a chronic shortage of donor organs that many medical officials attribute to Jewish religious taboos against such donations.

First of all the religious Jewish population is about 20% of Israelis. I hardly think that this is the only factor in shortage of donor organs. But what's worse is the description of the problem with organ donation as a "taboo." The Halacha or Jewish law concerning organ donation is very complex and is linked to the laws governing the end of life. I suppose if I asked my doctor - who is an expert in halachah too - that he would give me one answer and if I asked my Rabbi he would give me another.

This is something that shouldn't have been dismissively referred to as a "taboo." It is an insult to Judaism as a religion.

Technorati Tags: Israel, Judaism.

Crossposted on Israpundit and Soccer Dad.