Israeli child in her arms, she ran: How Indian nanny saved Moshe from Pak terrorists
India and Israel have built close ties over the years, but the two nations' relationship has also had moments of a more personal kind. On more than one occasion, Indians have found themselves stepping in when Israeli lives were at risk.
We saw one such moment on Wednesday, when a routine journey from Dubai to Tel Aviv turned into a fight for survival for the 174 passengers aboard flydubai Flight FZ1073. The man who stood between the passengers and the disaster was Smit Machchhar, an Indian pilot from Mumbai, who prevented a 9/11-like crash.
Despite being seriously injured after being stabbed midair by his Omani co-pilot, Machchhar fought back and managed to open the cockpit door, allowing passengers and crew members to overpower the attacker.
This wasn't the first time an Indian had stepped in to help Israelis and avert an absolute catastrophe.
Eighteen years earlier, in Mumbai, another Indian found herself in a terrifying hostage crisis at Chabad House β a Jewish community and outreach centre in Colaba, south Mumbai. Her name was Sandra Samuel.
Let's have a closer look at how Sandra Samuel rescued a young Jewish hostage, Moshe, during one of the worst terror attacks in India's history.THE NOVEMBER NIGHT MUMBAI CAME UNDER ATTACK IN 2008
On November 26, 2008, 10 Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorists from Pakistan arrived in Mumbai by sea and launched coordinated attacks across the city. The assault continued for nearly 60 hours, targeting places including Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus (CSMT), the Taj Mahal Palace hotel, Oberoi-Trident hotels, Leopold Cafe, Cama Hospital and Nariman House, also known as Chabad House.
By the end of the attacks, 166 civilians and security personnel had been killed and more than 300 injured. Among those killed were 26 foreign nationals from 14 countries. Nine of the 10 attackers were also killed by security forces, while Ajmal Kasab was captured alive.
The terrorists deliberately attacked places that offered a combination of high visibility, large numbers of civilians and international significance. But Chabad House was different from the railway stations and hotels. It is a Jewish outreach centre in Colaba, run by Chabad-Lubavitch emissaries Rabbi Gavriel Holtzberg and his wife, Rivka. The centre was particularly known among Jewish travellers, including young Israelis who came to Mumbai after completing their military service.
At Chabad House, the victims were six Jewish people β Rabbi Gavriel Holtzberg, his wife Rivka, who was pregnant, Rabbi Leibish Teitelbaum, Rabbi Bentzion Kruman, Israeli grandmother Yocheved Orpaz, and Mexican citizen Norma Shvarzblat-Rabinovich. The nationalities and dual-citizenship details are recorded differently in contemporary accounts, but all six were among those murdered at the Jewish centre.
Rabbi Gavriel Holtzberg and Rivka Holtzberg's two-year-old son, Moshe Holtzberg, survived. He survived because of Sandra Samuel. Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meet with Moshe Holtzberg (C), son of slain US Rabbi Gavriel Holtzberg who was killed with his wife in the November 26, 2008 attacks on the Chabad House in Mumbai. The young Moshe was rescued by his nanny Sandra Samuel. (Image: AFP) SANDRA HEARD MOSHE CRYING, RAN TO SAVE HIM FROM TERRORISTS
Samuel was a nanny who had worked for the Holtzberg family. When the terrorists stormed Nariman House, she hid inside the building as gunfire erupted. She and another employee, Qazi Zakir Hussain, sheltered in a room while the attack unfolded around them.
Samuel and Hussain went upstairs. Inside, they found the Holtzbergs dead. Moshe was crying beside his parents. Samuel picked up the child and carried him out of the building while the terrorists were still inside.
That moment would become one of the most enduring images of the Mumbai attacks β an Indian woman running to safety with a terrified two-year-old Jewish child in her arms. Contemporary accounts credit Samuel and Hussain with getting Moshe out of Nariman House alive.
The scale of what Samuel had done became clear only after the siege ended. Moshe had lost both his parents. He was the sole survivor of his immediate family from the Chabad House attack.
Samuel left India for Israel with Moshe shortly after the attack, where he was raised by his grandparents and other family members.
Sandra, who had worked with the Holtzbergs, remained closely associated with Moshe and visited him in Israel after the attacks. In 2010, Israel decided to grant her citizenship in recognition of her actions. Her rescue of the toddler became one of the most remembered stories from the Chabad House siege.TWO INDIANS, TWO MOMENTS, 18 YEARS APART
There is a sort of symmetry between Samuel's story and Machchhar's.
Samuel was not a soldier or a commando. She was a nanny who heard a child she had taken care of, crying inside a building occupied by terrorists. She chose to move towards him even as death seemed possible, and carried Moshe to safety.
Machchhar, too, after being stabbed by his co-pilot inside the cockpit, 30,000 feet above ground, fought back, and opened the cockpit door, before the aircraft could become a mass-casualty disaster.
The circumstances were very different, and so were the dangers. But the two stories now seemingly share a thread. Eighteen years apart, two moments in which Israeli lives and families found an Indian standing between them and catastrophe.- Ends(Written by Anand Singh)
