Yehuda Katz buried on Jerusalem’s Mount of Olives, 44 years after falling in Lebanon battle
Times of Israel · LC · trust 50/100
The funeral for Sgt. First Class Yehuda Katz was held Friday in Jerusalem, 44 years after he went missing in the First Lebanon War’s battle of Sultan Yacoub.
Hundreds of people lined the streets to pay their last respects as the funeral procession set off from the Kerem B’Yavne yeshiva in southern Israel, where Katz studied before enlisting in the Israel Defense Forces.
His remains were returned to Israel on Tuesday from Lebanon, where he went missing during the 1982 battle in Lebanon’s Beqaa Valley along with Sgt. First Class Zachary Baumel and Sgt. First Class Zvi Feldman. The fighting claimed the lives of 21 Israeli servicemen and injured more than 30.
Baumel’s remains were recovered with Russian assistance and returned to Israel in 2019, while Feldman’s remains were recovered by Mossad agents in May 2025. The IDF said Katz’s bones were recovered in a special operation led by the Military Intelligence Directorate in coordination with the Mossad spy agency.
Among those attending Katz’s funeral at the Jewish cemetery on the Mount of Olives were Mossad chief Roman Gofman and the government’s former hostage and missing persons pointman Gal Hirsch.
Katz’s brother Avi said the family would be sitting shiva — the seven-day Jewish mourning period — for him “because until now, we had not given up hope of finding him alive.”
“As far as we are concerned, Yehuda was killed this week, not 44 years ago.”
Avi Katz said that when his father was first told by the army that Yehuda was missing, he responded, “Auschwitz isn’t over,” referring to the notorious Nazi death camp.
“When they informed us this week about the [forensic] identification, we struggled for 14 hours to be finally convinced,” he told the mourners. “Brother, today we are burying you, but this isn’t our personal story. It’s the story of the people of Israel.”
Recalling the years of praying for Yehuda’s return and the influence he had on their family despite his absence, Avi Katz said the return of his brother’s remains “was not a feeling of relief and happiness, but of pain and deep sorrow.”
“It’s like someone stuck a knife deep in your heart,” he said.
Katz was also eulogized by the head of the Kerem B’Yavneh yeshiva in southern Israel, Rabbi Mordechai Greenberg, who pointed to Katz as proof that military conscription does not prevent one from living a religious lifestyle.
“There are those who think that yeshiva students are damaged in the army,” he said, referring to current discourse around the conscription of ultra-Orthodox men. “With Yehuda, it was the opposite.”
Col. Gal Levy, commander of the 10th Armored Brigade, delivered a similar message.
“The legacy Yehuda left us is the understanding that you can come from different worlds and [still] fight alongside each other. Yehuda wasn’t forced to choose between worlds, he naturally connected them,” Levy said.
He added: “After 44 years, Yehuda, you’re home. We pray and hope that you will be the last of the fallen.”
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