Lior Ziv - His camera was his weapon against terrorism By Ruth Sinai, Haaretz Correspondent IDF Spokeswoman Brigadier-General Ruth Yaron described Lior Ziv's camera as his weapon against terrorism in her eulogy at Ziv's funeral Sunday.
Ziv, 19, a photographer for the IDF Spokesman's unit, was its first combat casualty.
At 6 A.M. Sunday, Yaron came to the home of David and Mimi Ziv to tell them how their son was killed.
Ziv had been sent to Rafah to photograph Givati soldiers exposing and destroying tunnels for smuggling arms from Egypt. His last picture shows a weapons dump there.
After hearing of Lior's death, his younger brother Daniel, 12, pulled out recent family photographs taken for a school "roots" project. Near the photos of his worshiped brother he wrote "may he rest in peace."
"You taught me everything I know," he wept at the funeral at Holon's military cemetery. "I'll miss you."
In the Eilon High School in Holon, Ziv studied photography and art and displayed his photographs at school exhibitions. The camera was also an integral part of his social life: He documented his friends and the parties and events he helped organize. His friends described him repeatedly as "overflowing with kindness."
A woman who was with Ziv from nursery school to the army said that once, when they were both in first grade, she forgot her sandwich at home and Lior gave her his. "He didn't stop giving," said a soldier friend.
Ziv was admitted to the IDF Spokesman's filming and photography unit after strict entrance exams. The unit consists of 30 people, mostly video photographers and a few stills photographers.
Ziv did not tell his mother that he had undergone combat training because he did not want to worry her. On Saturday he called to tell her he was on his way to photograph something in Be'er Sheva.
On Passover eve his grandmother asked him if he was doing anything dangerous. "No way," he said. "I'm a jobnik [paper pusher] in the Kirya." His father, the CEO of Carmel Mizrahi, was the only one who knew.
The operation in Rafah was Ziv's first complex mission. He asked to be on a team with his two more experienced friends, a video photographer and sound man. The video photographer was badly wounded in the leg; the sound man, who was hit by shrapnel, attended the funeral. http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=285757&contrassID=
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