“Miracle After Miracle”; Hatzolah Heroes of Tarzana Rescue Children, Treat Patient Under Gunfire

By Matis Glenn

When T.F., a recently married Hatzolah member with Hatzlolah of Tarzana, L.A. responded to a call on Shabbos afternoon for an unresponsive man, a woman he encountered warned him about shots she heard that were fired. He dismissed her statements as an overreaction, attributing it to the sounds commonly heard from a nearby auto repair shop. But when he saw two shady-looking men outside of the drug dispensary next to the shul he was called to, his military training as a soldier in the IDF made him notice some body language that suggested that they may be carrying weapons.

Hurrying into the Hatzolah van of his friend and colleague, M.B., they promptly signaled the LAPD to report to the scene of what would turn out to have been a homicide of a man inside the dispensary in the normally quiet neighborhood, deep in the Valley of southwest Los Angeles. Hatzolah had just begun dispatching its squad of volunteer EMT’s to the area a few weeks ago.

Before entering the van, the two men and T.F. exchanged looks. “These guys looked like they could have just killed someone, and then be very relaxed afterwards. They gave me cold, calculated stares.” T.F. thought he was finished with that uncomfortable encounter, and turned his attention to the unconscious patient he was called to rescue, who was laid up in the shul. When M.B. turned the car off and the pair were taking out their gear, they suddenly heard gunshots whizzing by them; they turned around and saw the two gunmen charging towards them from the dispensary, some 30 yards away. As they ran, the assailants fired many rounds.

Both T.F. and M.B.’s first reaction was to rescue the eight children who had been enjoying a Shabbos afternoon outside the shul. They both “threw” the kids, ranging in ages from 5 to 13, into the relative safety of the shul, leaving themselves vulnerable and open to attack by the hoodied marauders.  “At this point we start throwing kids into the shul back and forth, they kept shooting at us, when they stopped to change magazines to reload I was relieved…at least they’re holding their guns improperly, so they’re probably not going to hit me. We started ducking, hiding in-between cars. Bullets were close to my head, glass that had broken off was hitting me. I’ve been in different situations, both in the military and with Hatzolah, but this is the most dangerous situation I was ever in. I personally thought I was a goner. We both thought we were done.” T.F. told Hamodia.

M.B. ran into the line of fire again after entering the shul.  “I thought I left a kid outside, I didn’t, thankfully. I ran back in and closed the door behind me.”

There were other Hatzolah members already in the shul, and they had to both calm the congregants, instruct them to take cover, check them for injuries, as well as stabilize the unconscious patient. 

The gunmen should have been able to easily break in, and unleash horrors upon the shul, but inexplicably did not. “There’s no reason why they didn’t finish us, they must have been 10 feet away….I don’t know why they didn’t come in and shoot…a fellow Hatzolah member passed away recently and I think he interceded on our behalf from shomayim.”

T.F. said.  “I was completely defenseless, without backup, gear, I thought.. who knows how long it would take for anyone to get there, the only thing that mattered was getting the kids to safety. It was definitely quite the scenario; there’s no logical reason why we should be alive.” He added.

The timing was astounding.

“Thanks to our units, we think we saved a lot of lives that day.” Eli Osherovitz, Public Information Officer of Hatzolah of Los Angeles told Hamodia. “We just started dispatching to Tarzana a few weeks ago, and right when our guys were there on a totally unrelated call, they ended up saving the lives of all the children.  It was miracle after miracle.”

M.B. added “The Hatzolah dispatch team and everyone involved did an incredible job, it was amazing to see.”

The incident is not being investigated as a hate crime, and the suspects are still at large at the time of this article. The gunmen are thought to have been suspicious of the Hatzolah members, and thought that they might report them to the police, according to Osherovitz.  

The LAPD said the suspects robbed the dispensary and then opened fire inside, killing an employee named Brian Garcia.