Israel Matzav

Moreno's miracle

The name Emanuel Moreno is one of the most searched names on this blog. I constantly see incoming hits in the site meter looking for details about one of the biggest heroes of the Second Lebanon War. You can find Emanuel Moreno's story here. Hashem Yinkom Damo - May God avenge his blood.

The two people who were shot at while driving their car at the Rimonim junction on Wednesday night were Emanuel's brother Rabbi Moshe Moreno and Moshe's wife. Moshe, a teacher at the Maale Ephraim pre-military academy, talks about the miracle of their survival.

From his hospital bed in Hadassah Hospital where the bullet wound to his leg is being treated, he spoke with Arutz-7’s Uzi Baruch on Thursday morning and said, “I’m not sure if I’m 37 years old – or one day old, after what happened to me last night. So I figure I’m somewhere in between, a youth of about 18 and a half… Only now that I am out of it, I can recount about ten miracles that happened to us in the space of about five minutes, with praise and thanks to G-d.”

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“My wife and I were traveling back from Jerusalem to Maaleh Ephraim," Rabbi Moreno recounted. "We passed by the trempiada [where Yesha residents wait for rides] at French Hill, where we often pick people up and drop them off at Kokhav HaShachar [about two miles out of the way – ed.]. Luckily, as it turned out, there was no one there, nor at the next “stop,” at Hizme. After the turnoff to Rimonim, a car 'settled' in back of me with his brights on; I tried to signal him in various ways to lower them, or to pass me, but he kept on playing with me, until I finally just gave up. But I didn’t suspect anything."

“Suddenly, around the curve between Rimonim and Kokhav HaShachar, he overtook me and began firing at me, from point-blank range essentially. It was an unbelievable miracle that he did not hit us, except for one bullet in my leg; my wife was not hit at all. The police told me later that there were nine bullet holes in my door, and only one hit me. What are the chances that a man standing next to you as he passes by you in a car and firing a Kalachnikov rifle in automatic will not hit you – one in a billion? One in two billion? … An amazing miracle. But there has to be some accounting as to who gave them these guns [towards the beginning of the Oslo process].

“I veered the car towards the right, and G-d enabled me to regain control: I opened the door, got my wife and myself out of our seat belts and out of the car and we rolled ourselves down and away from the road. Another miracle is that my wife just ‘happened’ to be holding her cell phone in her hand, and also that it was a Pelephone and not Orange [cellular companies in Israel]; just 2-3 months ago we switched it, as there is no reception for Orange in that area. We found ourselves behind a big boulder, and I phoned a friend of mine in the area to call the army… I panicked for a moment and started to yell, but another miracle was that the terrorists or other Arabs were not there to hear me… This was a series of miracles that only now am I beginning to grasp.”

Moshe speculates as to why he and his wife survive. I suspect - although obviously I cannot prove - that his celebrated brother intervened with the Heavenly court at exactly the right moment.

May Moshe and his wife have a Refuah Shleima, a full and complete recovery.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 7:18 AM