Friends And Comrades Of IDF Lone Soldier Found Dead Demand: Bury Him In Mt. Herzl Military Cemetery

JERUSALEM (VINnews) — Friends and commanders of the late Josh Boone z’l are demanding that he be allowed to be buried at the military cemetery on Mount Herzl. Boone, a 27-year-old lone soldier and US citizen who immigrated from Idaho in 2015, was found dead in his home over the weekend, just two weeks after being discharged from the IDF. He had served 725 consecutive days in reserve duty since the outbreak of the war on October 7.

“This was his explicit request, both to his parents and to his friends,” Captain Chaim Meizlish, a commander in Battalion 450 and Boon’s former direct commander, told the Hayom site. “He told them clearly: ‘If anything happens to me, I want to be buried on Mount Herzl.’”

Boone, who enlisted as a sniper, served on the front lines in Gaza and Lebanon throughout the war. “He said that as long as the war continued, he had to contribute and be part of it,” Meizlish recounts. “When his unit was released, he voluntarily transferred to another battalion. That’s how he kept fighting. His final framework was the Carmeli Brigade.”

According to his friends, Boone eliminated at least 50 terrorists during his service. However, the heavy psychological strain of prolonged combat left its mark. In recent months, he began showing symptoms of post-traumatic stress and addiction. The army referred him to a rehabilitation facility in Yehud, but at the end of December, less than two weeks ago, he was discharged from the IDF due to a lack of reserve days available. Over the past weekend, Boone left the facility and traveled to his home, where he was later found dead. The circumstances of his death are still under investigation.

Because he was formally a civilian at the time of his death, Boone is not eligible for recognition as an IDF fallen soldier, and therefore there is currently no plan to bury him on Mount Herzl or in another military plot. His friends, however, are outraged by what they describe as “bureaucratic arbitrariness.”

“For every rule, there has to be an exception,” Meizlish says. “Everyone understands that he died as a direct result of the prolonged service that affected him. The real mistake was discharging him from reserve duty in the first place. He was mentally wounded, and every wounded soldier is entitled to treatment and continued support from the army, even if it takes months or years. I know this from soldiers I personally referred to Ram 2.”

“They used him for more than 700 days, and then, when he was no longer needed, they just threw him away?” he asks painfully. “That’s unacceptable. It also needs to be examined why he was allowed to leave the facility at all. The fact that he went home and died a few hours later, regardless of the circumstances, is a serious failure in itself. This should not have happened.”

Meizlish concludes: “We want him to be buried on Mount Herzl so that he receives the honor he deserves, because he truly deserves it. His parents and siblings are in the United States. He chose to immigrate to Israel and serve the country out of the Jewish spark that burned within him. After everything he went through and contributed, he deserves to be recognized as an IDF fallen soldier.”