This year there were three new pictures hanging with the picture of Maj. Benji Hillman at HaBayit shel Benji (Benji’s House) on Remembrance Day.
HaBayit shel Benji is a home for lone combat soldiers in central Israel which provides housing, food, cleaning and laundry services, and more for the 87 soldiers who call the house a home.
It was founded in memory of Benji, a company commander who was killed in battle in Maroun al-Ras during the Second Lebanon War, just weeks after he married his fiancée, Ayala.
Remembering the fallen every year
Every year on Remembrance Day, Benji’s picture hangs in a special spot in the lobby of the home. This year, his picture was joined by the pictures of three soldiers who lived in the home and were killed during the Israel-Hamas war.
Sgt. Nathanel Young, Sgt.-Maj. Meron Gersh, and St.-Sgt. Yisrael Suissa are the first soldiers to have fallen while living in the home, and this year was the first time that the soldiers and staff have had to navigate this kind of loss.
Young, who served in Golani’s 13th Battalion, was killed in Israel’s South on October 7. Gersh, who served in the elite Yahalom unit within the Combat Engineering Corps, fell in battle in Gaza on January 2. Suissa was killed on March 5 in a motorcycle accident while on leave after fighting for 150 days in Gaza.
Walking into the house, it’s shocking for staff to see four photographs on the wall where there once was one.
The death of each of these young men was its own watershed moment for the home.
The first death taught staff what needed to be done when losing one of their own soldiers: who needed to be called; how the other soldiers needed to be told and comforted; and what wreaths and photographs needed to be purchased.
The second taught staff that this could happen again, that the worst might repeat itself over and over.The third, a death occurring while the soldier was on leave after surviving so much in Gaza, showed the staff that this unbearable loss could also come at the most unexpected times, when they thought that their soldiers were out of harm’s way.
REELING FROM the losses of their soldiers, and from dealing with the new reality imposed by the war – which for the house includes supporting wounded soldiers; having dozens of soldiers serving in Gaza and Israel’s South; and hundreds of the house’s alumni in reserves and in need of gear and help with transportation – the months following October 7 passed in a blur.
Staff members were focused on getting lifesaving gear to alumni in reserves who were often in need of the most basic equipment, making sure that they were in touch with all of their soldiers to offer support, reassuring panicked parents, and fundraising to cover additional costs. This on top of the normal tasks necessary to keep a home for 87 young people functioning and supporting staff who were also living through the tumult and tragedy of October 7 and the ensuing war.
Over the course of the first few months of the war, multiple soldiers and alumni from the home were wounded, some critically. Staff members were stretched even thinner as they visited and cared for hospitalized soldiers while still working to keep the house running and take care of their soldiers in combat.
On top of dealing with this chaotic situation, the staff had to handle these challenges without the help of multiple staff members who were called to reserves on October 7, including the house’s operations manager.
In spite of all this, it was not long before HaBayit shel Benji’s CEO, Saul Rurka, who is Benji’s first cousin, shifted focus from just getting the house through the war to continuing full speed ahead on a massive project started long before the war – the building of an additional home with another 93 rooms for lone combat soldiers.
By early November, Rurka had his team focused on additional fundraising for the new building, overseeing the construction, and planning purchases of furniture for the new rooms to make sure the project was on track.
Doubling the number of soldiers help with new building
This new home is set to more than double the number of soldiers HaBayit shel Benji can care for, and construction on the four-story building was nearing completion on October 7.
With most of Israel’s construction industry frozen by a shortage of workers, and HaBayit shel Benji staff struggling with the herculean task of caring for hundreds of lone soldiers and reservists fighting all over the country, as well as mourning losses in their own personal lives, the CEO’s shift of focus at first seemed absurd.
For some staff, the idea of working on anything other than the war effort seemed not only impossible – it seemed wrong.
In hindsight, however, Rurka was shifting his focus to a vitally important but often overlooked truth of the war: A critical part of the war is what comes on the day after it ends. Life must go on; there is no alternative; and so the matter of shaping life after the war is crucial.
The Israel-Hamas war has touched every aspect of life in Israel, changing society in surprising ways. Rurka recognized that it was necessary to look to the “day after,” even as it was impossible to imagine this day could come.
Beyond ensuring that his organization would be on track for the day after the war, this shifted focus had the byproduct of instilling hope in Rurka’s staff.
Working to continue to grow and expand and move toward the future of the organization reminded the team at HaBayit shel Benji that there is a future, one that will inevitably come, and which demands their attention.
It pulled them from the tragedy of getting through each day, focused only on the immediate needs of their soldiers and the losses they were experiencing. It reminded them that there would be a day after the tragedy and fear they were living through.
Rurka recognized this need to keep the staff’s heads above the current of work caused by the war, and to keep moving his organization forward.
NOW, CONSTRUCTION of the new home is almost complete. Another 93 rooms are waiting for furniture and for the dozens of soldiers already interviewed by Rurka and his team who will move in in the coming months.
Like soldiers at the existing home, these soldiers will have their every need taken care of. They will receive three meals a day, their laundry will be done for them, their private rooms will be cleaned, and their sheets washed. They will have staff available to them 24/7, and they will be offered logistic, transportation, and emotional support, as well as access to mental health professionals.
Rurka’s foresight and ability to keep moving is not about forgetting the reality of the war or those whom the house has lost; that is impossible. It is about remembering that there will be a life after this tragedy, and we have a responsibility to ourselves and those around us to work to make this life what we want it to be.
Lone soldiers will always need a home. They will always need someone to take care of them. When he started working for the day after the war right in the thick of it, Rurka positioned himself to be ready to take care of them, to be ready to meet this future head-on.
In a way it makes sense that Rurka would know to look to the future. As someone who, together with his family, has made a living legacy for his cousin after tragically losing him, he knows how to look through loss to find the next steps.
This alchemy of making tragedy into a loving, supportive family for those who need it is already inspiring others. Suissa’s family is already fundraising to found a teen center and donate a Torah scroll in his name, partially inspired by how HaBayit shel Benji keeps its namesake alive.
Rurka and the new home show that, as impossible as it may feel, it is essential to look past the war, to remember that there will be a day when it is over, and to prepare for that day now.
The writer worked for Saul Rurka at HaBayit shel Benji, including in the months before and after October 7. She was also a lone soldier and lived at the home.