“I remember waking up at home in Jerusalem, very early on Shabbat morning because my wife’s phone kept beeping; and then we watched TV. Already, at 6am, there was a video of soldiers being taken into Gaza’’.

Dr. Cohen Arazi is a trauma surgeon; his wife, Noya Cohen Arazi, is an intensive-care nurse. They both work at Hadassah Ein Kerem hospital in Jerusalem

On October 7, Dr. Cohen Arazi worked in the Hadassah trauma unit, which usually treats injuries from car crashes and accidents, so it was a big shift from blunt injuries to soldiers coming in with shrapnel wounds, leg injuries, gunshot wounds.

”We started getting casualties later that day. Every bed had someone in it. Specialists from all departments came to evaluate patients.”

Some of the soldiers were in bad shape, he said. Often, it took hours to be rescued. Once they were in helicopters, no part of the country is too far from a major hospital; Jerusalem is only about 15 minutes from the border with Gaza.

First responders put tourniquets on wounds, Dr. Cohen Arazi said. “A tourniquet is lifesaving, but within an hour you should be in a hospital, where a doctor can open it and do surgery. But it often took about eight hours. That’s a long time. The tissue doesn’t like it, especially the muscles; the cells begin to die, and the nerves start to fail.”

Hadassah Ein Kerem saved not only most of the soldiers, but most of their limbs as well. “We had a soldier who had tourniquets on both his legs and the upper limbs. Hadassah have very low amputation rates,” Dr. Cohen Arazi said; the hospital has both highly skilled health-care providers and cutting-edge technology.’’

Dr Cohen Arazi is 44, like his parents, he was born in Jerusalem. His high school required a year of public service, and he chose to work with first responders. “My desire to be a doctor began when I was 15 and first went on an ambulance,” he said. “I started volunteering for Magen David Adom, the Israeli Red Cross-equivalent.

Dr. Cohen Arazi went to Tel Aviv University after the IDF, and then to medical school in Hungary. His first love was trauma surgery, but for 18 months he did organ transplants.

“About two and a half years ago, I started doing trauma again, and never looked back. It is an amazing job. A trauma surgeon must have the capacity for detail, the instinct for precision, and the ability to put aside emotion but retain the capacity to care deeply.

Dr Cohen Arazi continued. “My nephew was a soldier, who had been called to the reserves. He came into my trauma unit. He was the last of five injured soldiers out of the helicopter. That was a very challenging time. I had to call my brother and tell him. I had to call my mom and tell her that her first grandchild was injured…

His nephew is okay now, Dr. Cohen Arazi said. “He had three weeks of hospitalisation, and then three months of rehabilitation. He still walks with a cane — but he is walking and having fun. He has hope.”

Hadassah sees patients from before their arrival in the emergency room through to their exit from long-term rehabilitation. It’s thrilling to see’’, he said.

The war has changed some things in the hospital, Dr. Cohen Arazi said. Many of the surgeons and other specialists are also reservists, so they’re out with their units.

The workload has become even more intense. He remembers the day when he was leaving to go home, exhausted and ready to be out of the hospital. After having told his wife that he was on his way, he was called back to the hospital again.

“But it’s not a nuisance. It’s good. Eventually the wounded soldiers will go home. They did everything for us, so we now are doing what we can to help them.”

Editors notes

Excerpt from an article in the Jewish Standard – Times of Israel By Joanne Palmer