Mara Tamaroff with her portrait as
IDF combat photographer
Photo
by Tim Boxer |
ISRAEL
BONDS
Army Didn’t
Want Her In
But Couldn’t Keep Her Out
By Tim Boxer
 ARA
TAMAROFF left suburban Philadelphia for a year of study at
Hebrew University, arriving two months before the current conflict
broke out.
She also waitressed at La
Piato, just of Ben Yehuda Street. In fact, she worked alongside an
Israeli Arab, two Palestinians and a Russian woman.
Suddenly the second
intifada changed her life.
“Don’t call it
intifada,” she corrected me. “In the first intifada they used
rocks. Today they’re shooting bullets, throwing grenades, and
firing missiles. This is a war.”
Customers stopped coming,
the Arab waiters disappeared, and the restaurant closed.
At the end of her year at
Hebrew University, Mara joined the army.
She wanted to be in a
fighting unit, but they rejected her because in high school
gymnastics she broke her back and had surgery.
“I started to cry. I
said I’m not leaving until you put me in the army.”
The IDF can rack up
success in the battlefield, but when they came up against Mara,
steeled with determination in her eyes and strength in her heart,
the recruiters wilted.
They sent her to basic
training with other people with disabilities, some of whom were in
wheelchairs. These people had normal hours from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.,
as many had to get home for medication and treatment.
Of course, that did not
satisfy Mara.
So they placed her in the
army spokesman’s unit. Still they treated her with kid gloves,
insisting she take a desk job as a translator. She balked.
“I just took a camera
and went out with combat units to shoot pictures,” she said.
Israel police officers Supt.
Ami Baran, Cpl. Lital Shemesh,
and Commander Sarina Yehuda |
Mara told me her story at
the Palace Hotel where Israel Bonds had assembled 13 military and
police officers fresh from Mideast turmoil. They were preparing to
embark on a North American speaking tour to convey first-hand
accounts of their experiences with Palestinian terrorists.
As a combat photographer,
Mara began documenting military operations in dangerous areas like
Jenin and anti-terrorist actions elsewhere, going where civilian
press were barred.
“In the photography
unit,” she said, “we send out photos to the media.”
Last month she
accompanied a patrol searching hundreds of houses in Hebron for
illegal weapons.
In one house they ripped
up the floorboards. They found bomb making material and a
terrorist cowering under the floor.
One day Mara befriended a
girl from the military court in Tel Aviv. After Mara left her she
heard an explosion. She grabbed her Nikon and ran out to the old
central bus station.
Her dramatic photo of the
carnage was blasted on the front page of the Jerusalem Post.
She collected photos from
the grieving families to help identify the bodies. From one
envelope she pulled out a picture of the young woman she met at
the military court that day.
Now a corporal, Mara is
second in command of her unit, with 10 army photographers under
her. She even has a seat on the helicopter of Chief of Staff Moshe
“Boogie” Ya’alon
(who succeeded Shaul Mofaz when he left to become
minister of defense).
“I am Boogie’s
personal photographer,” Mara said proudly.
When her two-year service
is up next January, she will go back to her family in Philadelphia
where her father James is an oral surgeon and mother Donna
an English teacher for dyslexic students.
“I plan to major in
advertising and Middle East Studies,” she said, “but I want to
work in Israel.” |
