Last update - 00:00 28/06/2007
3 years after first Qassam deaths, injured guard relives the trauma
By Mijal Grinberg
Three years ago today, the first two people to be killed by Qassam rockets - three-year-old Afik Zahavi-Ohayun and 49-year-old Mordechai Yosefov - died a few meters away from Moran Zakzak in the Negev town of Sderot. Now 24, Zakzak still suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder, but has yet to receive any assistance from the state.
On that fateful day, Zakzak was doing her daily rounds as a security guard. As usual, Afik gave her a hug and a kiss as she passed by his nursery school and continued on her way. But she didn't get far before disaster struck.
"There was no [air-raid] siren then," Zakzak recalled yesterday in her parents' home in Sderot, where she lives. "I had just begun crossing the street, and suddenly I saw a black cloud. I flew from the blast."
Despite having been hit in her spine and her left hand and leg, Zakzak made her way to Yosefov and the toddler. "I rushed to press the Mirs [communication device], to call for rescue services," she said. She called for help, and then passed out.
Zakzak's life has not been the same since. Three years ago, she had just begun her studies, with the goal of becoming a kindergarten teacher. But after Afik died, Zakzak couldn't bear the thought of working with children. She relives her experience with every air-raid siren - indeed, nearly every moment of the day - and, burdened by the emotional as well as the physical scars of her brush with death, had a breakdown last month, when Sderot was being targeted by an unusually large amount of rockets. Zakzak was hospitalized and released only recently.
It hasn't been all bad, though; Zakzak got married a few months ago. However, the life change has done little to allay her deep fears.
"I'm afraid to leave the house," said Zakzak.
She isn't the only one who has been affected.
"Everyone at home is apprehensive," said Zakzak's mother, Aviva.
Zakzak is typical of those who suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, according to Dr. Adriana Katz, who runs the mental health center in Sderot, in that it completely impairs normal functioning.
The center has recommended that the National Insurance Institute provide Zakzak with disability benefits, but the NII has yet to do so. The insurance institute said it would send her a notice shortly on her level of disability, after which she will receive compensation for which she is entitled.