Israel’s Leiters: A Family’s Loss Mirrors a Nation’s Deepening Divide

Ambassador Yechiel Leiter has spent the past ten days alternating between the intensive-care unit where his son, IDF reservist Neria Leiter, lies in serious condition after a terror attack at a West Bank checkpoint on Route 443, and the maternity ward where his pregnant daughter Sarah gave birth to a granddaughter. The family’s earlier loss includes Maj. (res.) Moshe Yedidya Leiter, killed in November 2023 by an explosion in a Hamas tunnel in Beit Hanoun, northern Gaza. The ambassador, a father of eight with seven surviving children, has become a public symbol of the personal cost borne by Israel’s security forces.

Times of Israel

He notes that the family, hailing from the West Bank settlement of Eli and aligned with the hard-right, now shares hospital corridors with Israelis from every political and religious spectrum. According to Eyal, the war has amplified pre-existing fractures: religious versus secular, ultra-Orthodox who avoid service versus religious Zionists who suffer battlefield casualties, and supporters versus opponents of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. He describes an “unbridgeable gulf” between a leadership that promotes legislation allowing tens of thousands of ultra-Orthodox men to evade conscription and a citizenry that continues to send its sons to the front.

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Lt. Col. The speech underscored a perceived disconnect between frontline soldiers and “extremist politicians” remaining safely behind the lines.

Times of Israel

Eyal’s commentary condemns the Israeli leadership as “self-interested, corrupt, and arrogant,” accusing it of ignoring advance warnings and failing to plan for a post-war reality. He cites the case of Sgt. Roni Eshel, who warned of an imminent Hamas assault but was dismissed and later killed at the Nahal Oz base on October 7.

Times of Israel

• “Our mission is to destroy Hamas,” — Lt. Col. Atias — Lt. Col. Atias

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