Tiferet Lapidot

Tiferet z"l, a 23-year-old Canadian-Israeli who grew up in the northern town of Harish was murdered at the Nova music festival in Kibbutz Re'im by Hamas terrorists. Tiferet was a beautiful, bright, smiling girl.

Her family waited and searched frantically for 10 days for news of Lapidot’s fate, before they were finally informed that her body had been found. While Tiferet was declared missing, her parents, Ohad and Sarit Lapidot, came out with a message to the people of the State of Israel. "We are the parents of Tiferet Lapidot, Tiferet has been missing since last Shabbat, and our hearts have been broken and shaking for a week, surrounded by a lot of love and concern from the country and the world, and we are thankful for that," her parents said. They asked the general public to light Shabbat candles in honor of Tiferet and the other missing persons.

Her aunt, Galit Goren, told a Canadian news outlet that Lapidot was “a beautiful girl with a beautiful heart.”

Goren said she had volunteered as an English teacher in South Africa and was most recently living in Australia, but had been visiting Israel for the Jewish holidays, which culminated in the brutal Hamas assault on southern Israel on Simhat Torah, claiming around 1,400 lives.

Another aunt, Racheli Ankri, shared the speech she gave at Lapidot’s funeral on Facebook.

“Thanks be to God that I was privileged to be part of your upbringing Tiffy,” she said. “That I got to taste from your sweet soul. Thank You that we are able to bring you to burial in Israel, that you did not fall into the hands of those animals… thanks be to God that they did not get to touch the sweet beauty of yours. Thank You for giving us such a beautiful and special gift — even if it was for a short time.”

Tiferet’s uncle, Staff Sgt. Asher Zaguri, was killed when he was just 21 years old in 2002, when a tank he was inside drove over an explosive device during an operation in Gaza.

“Twenty-one years after Asher, our brother, was killed also in Gaza, I thought that I already knew something about death,” said Ankri in her eulogy at Lapidot’s funeral. “About loss. About grief. About rising up. But it seems that You had new wisdom that you wanted to give us.”

Another aunt, Dvora Zaguri, recalled Lapidot’s love of travel and daredevil ways.

“Tiferet hiked the Israel Trail and flew and swam with sharks, surfed on waves, bungee jumped — be careful Tiffy, bungee is dangerous,” Zaguri wrote. “But the angel of death lurks patiently — you don’t know what is really dangerous.”

Her sister, Ateret Lapidot, wrote on Facebook that she cannot come to terms with the loss.

“I just don’t realize that I won’t see you anymore — your smile, beautiful, big and bright — you won’t turn my way when I walk into the room, one big bright light to everyone around you,” Ateret wrote.

“You touched people at their deepest point, they were drawn to you like a magnet and you let them love you, you let them connect to you,” she added. “I love you so, so much and I miss you — give me your shoulder from up there, because I’m going to need it.”
Source: The Times of Israel