Senior Division 36 officer wounded in Lebanon was once honored for stopping a Gaza attacker bare-handed

The deputy commander of IDF Division 36, who was moderately wounded on Wednesday in southern Lebanon in the same incident that killed reserve Master Sgt. Alexander Filin, 29, of Haifa, had been awarded a commander’s citation about two decades earlier for exceptional bravery in Gaza. At the time, he said, “All the time I told myself there was no way the terrorists would slip through my fingers.”

The cited incident took place on July 21, 2007, when he was commanding a company in Battalion 12 of the Golani Brigade. His force was rushed to respond to a reported infiltration from the Gaza Strip and spotted two armed terrorists at very close range. He and another commander charged toward them while directing the troops.

During the fight, he identified a terrorist near his soldiers, ordered them to lie down and ran at the attacker, only to discover his weapon was out of bullets. He then approached the terrorist with his bare hands, risking his life. When the terrorist tried to detonate a fragmentation grenade, the officer managed to cause it to explode in a way that took most of the shrapnel, and after being wounded he kept holding the attacker until his soldiers stormed in and killed him.

A few months later, then Southern Command chief Yoav Gallant presented him with the citation. The IDF said his conduct showed “extraordinary courage, determination and leadership” and was a key factor in foiling a planned attack inside Israel. The officer later recalled, “I get to a situation where I am one meter away and I run out of ammunition. A split second of thought, and I decide to do it, just jump on him and neutralize him.”

The IDF said his actions reflected the reality in Gaza at the time, when troops were involved in dozens of close-range encounters with terrorists. In the latest Lebanon incident, besides Filin and the deputy division commander, a reserve battalion commander and another reserve fighter were moderately wounded, while an NCO, two reserve soldiers and a reserve female soldier were lightly wounded.