Alexei Neikof, a 19-year-old boy, was on his first day of duty in the Israeli Defense Forces. His mission: to escort 35 Jewish children from the West Bank settlement of Kfar Darom to their school in Atzoma. Suddenly, he noticed an Opel car with Palestinian license plates trying to get ever so close to the school bus. Alexei immediately realized that the driver was up to no good. So he veered his jeep into the car, detonating over 30 kg of explosives it carried. The blast killed Alexei immediately and wounded his fellow soldiers.

The children on the bus escaped unharmed,
thank G-d.

Just a few years before making the ultimate sacrifice to save his fellow Jews, Alexei barely knew he was Jewish. That all changed when a rabbi in Alexei’s hometown of Kharkov, Ukraine, invited him to go to the first Tzivos Hashem Passover Camp. After ten days of living in a Jewish environment with 200 other boys his age, Alexei resolved to get more involved in Judaism and to be a proud Jew. A while later he decided to move to Israel and join the army.

The 35 children and their parents are forever grateful that guarding the bus that fateful day was Alexei, a true Jewish hero.