Jerusalem – Gush Etzion junction stabbing attack victim Ari Fuld was a well-known social media personality and Israel advocate.
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Despite being seriously injured in the attack, Fuld managed to pursue his assailant and shot him before collapsing from his wounds.
Fuld will be laid to rest tonight at 11:30 p.m., according to the Efrat municipality.
US Ambassador David Friedman expressed condolences to the Fuld family in a tweet, saying that “America grieves as one of its citizens was brutally murdered by a Palestinian terrorist.”
Fuld, Friedman wrote, “was a passionate defender of Israel & an American patriot. He represented the best of both countries & will be deeply missed. May his family be comforted & his memory be blessed.”
Fuld was a father of four and a dual US-Israeli citizen. He served as a sergeant in an elite paratroopers unit in the IDF reserves and also served on the Efrat emergency squad.
His Facebook page states: “Living the dream! I have a love for the Nation of Israel, Land of Israel and Torah of Israel.”
Well-known in Jewish communities around the globe, Fuld was assistant director of Standing Together, an organization that supports IDF soldiers, according to his personal website. He was an outspoken defender of Israel in the media and online, regularly engaging with Israel’s critics through his Facebook and Twitter accounts.
According to his personal website, Fuld was about to launch a new Israel advocacy website in English.
He held a fourth level black belt in karate and had taught the martial art to hundreds of children in Efrat.
Settler spokesman Josh Hasten, who said he had known Fuld for about a decade, said his friend traveled widely to showcase “the beauty and reality of life” in the country.
He delivered care packages to Israeli soldiers and would go on solidarity trips to communities near the Gaza Strip during times of fighting with the Hamas militant group, Hasten said.
“When the rockets were falling, that’s when he would get in his car and go down to Sderot,” Hasten said.
A civilian bystander also shot at the attacker, identified Khalil Jabarin, 17, from the West Bank village of Yatta near Hebron.
Haaretz cited a source close to the Jabarin family as saying that the teen informed his parents that he planned to carry out an attack at the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron. The family told security forces about their son’s plan but could not find him near the tomb.
Fawzi Barhoum, a spokesman for the Hamas militant group that rules the Gaza Strip, called the West Bank stabbing a “natural response to Israeli crimes against Palestinians” in occupied territory. It did not claim responsibility for the attack.
Ari’s brother, Hillel Fuld, a well known hi-tech guru, wrote on his Twitter account, “He lived as a hero and died as a hero. My big bro is gone. Thanks for the messages. Really. Just looking for oxygen now.”
A second brother Eytan, is the spokesperson for MK Bezalel Smotrich (Bayit Yehudi).
In a commentary on the weekly Torah portion on his Facebook page, posted on September 14th, Fuld spoke about Moses’ last words to the people of Israel before he died and speculated on the nature of leadership.
Moses tells them to be strong and brave because God will not abandon the people of Israel, Fuld said.
Senior Israeli politicians and organizations mourned Fuld’s death Sunday.
“The entire People of Israel is pained at the shocking murder of Ari Fuld this morning in Gush Etzion,” Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein wrote in a Twitter post. “Ari demonstrated rare courage, pursued the terrorist but unfortunately his strength did not last.”
Deputy Defense Minister Eli Ben-Dahan lauded him as a hero, and MK Moti Yogev (Bayit Yehudi) said that Fuld was a warrior in death and in life. “Just as he fought during his lifetime to honestly portray the people of Israel, so too in his death, Ari overcame his murderer in order to prevent further harm to civilians.”
Peace Now and the New Israel Fund both published statements expressing their sorrow over Fuld’s murder.
Prime Minister Netanyahu lauded Fuld, a pro-Israel activist and member of the Efrat rapid response team, calling him an “advocate for Israel”.
“In the name of every citizen of Israel, I send my condolences to the family of Ari Fuld, who was murdered today in a terrorist attack in Gush Etzion,” Netanyahu wrote in a Facebook post Sunday.
“With his last strength, Ari fought heroically against the terrorist and prevented a greater tragedy. Ari was a wonderful father to four children. He was an advocate for Israel who fought to spread the truth about Israel. May his memory be a blessing.”
All my condolences to the Fuld family. How sad!! Poor man! Poor wife and kids. He innocently thought hes doing the will of G d by living in the settlements and is talking bout G d protecting Moses. G d protects His people. We don’t understand. But G d wants every Jew to live in a safe place & never to put urself in harms way. Thats G ds call.
These people are all unfortunately endangering themselves and their families. A responsible person shld get a life in a decent place. And NO, SETTLMENTS DO NOT SAVE LIVES!
Hashen Y. D.
If it weren’t for Gush Etzion, no place in Yerushalayim would be safe. B’DE, this is how he died, it’s not why he died. Hashem runs the world.
You are kofer betorah. The vast majority of talmidei chachomim and tzaddikim travel to these contested places such as Chevron, and the Western Wall. Rov poskim permit living in places like Efrat where the kodesh was murdered today. And before he’s even buried you have the nerve to imply that by the very fact that he was beyond the green line he was transgressing the torah???!!!
You are a sick kofer. You and your sick gedolim who speak loshan hora against kedoshim and kefira against the acceptance of the psak of the majority.
You and your sick rebbes are kofrim because you equate the vast majority of shomrei shabbas and mitzvohs as gornisht. You and your kofrei rebbes are gornisht!
what is this TRAITOROUS self hating leftist government of Bibi going to do about this? well,we all know the answer -nothing ,nada,zilch,Jews in Israel are being sacrificed by this gangster government on the altar of liberalism and political correctness and appeasement to the antisemitic swines of the EU. ,
People of Israel have you gone mad why are you tolerating this murderous obscenity ? YOU MUST RISE UP by the millions and vomit out this TRAITOROUS government and hang these gangsters from the nearest gallows and instaL a regime that will defend its people and its God given land.
There is only one solution to this murderous situation “THEY ALL MUST GO”
Time for mourning, not uninformed bickering. You guys can argue the same thing on multiple threads and add nothing new to the argument.
#1 is correct al pi Torah, though it might have been better to wait before posting.
Regarding those attacking him:
#2 – Yishmael’s children preaching hatred and murder are certainly not justified in doing so. Period. But their doing so against residents of the Zionist State, and particularly those over the “Green Line”, make it all the more sensible to NOT live there.
#3 – The land was also was taken away from us by Hashem. Regardless, if the situation there is unsafe, Hashem’s gift of the land to us does not in any way negate vaChai baHem, etc.
#4 – Whether or not the settlers do, in fact, keep safe(r) the residents of Israel, is wholly irrelevant to where one should, al pi halacha, choose to reside.
#5 – Actually, it is Zionism that is an unparalleled massive kefirah baTorah. Mr. Fuld, HY”D, was murdered at the Gush Junction, not in Efrat. And Rav Shach Zatza”L wrote strongly against settling in the territories.
#6 – So, then, Jews should move out of all of Israel?
#9 – Rav Elchonon Wasserman HY”D, too, wrote that two idols that some Jews worshiped pre-WW II were Nationalism (i.e. Zionism) and Socialism. So, Hashem, in return, created an unholy merger of the two (i.e. the Nazis).
#10 – Beitar and Givas Zeev are not the Gush Junction. “Technically a settlement” does not mean it’s therefore okay to, say, live in Ramallah (yes, I know there is no settlement there).
So, too, living in Beitar is either different, or even very different, from living in certain other parts of the “West Bank”.
#11 – Of course, we all need Hashem’s protection, no matter where we live.
But it is simply foolish to equate NY’s 9/11 with Israel that has never known a day of peace in its very bloody existence and is the only country in the world other than North Korea that has a compulsory draft for not only its 18-year old boys, but its girls as well.
May Hashem send a nechama to the Fuld families and may Hashem watch over all His children and send Mashiach BB”A.