Military mission to rescue a vehicle stolen from a haredi

During Shabbos - a military operation to extract a stolen vehicle: the car of Fishel Bernstein, a grocery store owner in Beitar Illit, was stolen on Friday afternoon and found by IDF forces during Shabbos.


"I arrived on Friday, like every day to the shop and parked my car next to it," says Bernstein in conversation with B'Chadrei Charedim. "I put the keys in the drawer of the cash register. At 9:30 I wanted to go out to do errands in town, but I saw that I could not find the car keys. Even after searches of other workers I could not find them. Having no choice, I went home, where I picked alternative keys, and went to the store to take the vehicle. Then I went on errands around town, and I went home."

"At 12:00 or so, my wife left the house to go to drive the car but was surprised to see the vehicle was gone. It turned out that the thieves had followed me, waited to see that no one was around - and fled with the vehicle."


From Ituron Bernstein was told that the car is already in Abu Dis. After calling the city center and the police, they asked him to go to the Gush Etzion police station to file a complaint.

"I called the city leaders," says Bernstein. "I pressured them to do all they can to return my car to me."


I arrived with a police car at the station to file a complaint, but the dispatcher was on the way home outside the station, and the police urged him to return to file the complaint and he agreed to their request.


Police station commander Gush Etzion and Beitar Illit, Superintendent Eyal Atia, was in constant telephone contact with me, since I complained about the theft of the vehicle and informed me of any developments in the investigation.

Ituran stated that the vehicle came to Abu Dis, east of Jerusalem, a Palestinian city located in b area and controlled by the Palestinian Authority, where police do not usually come to rescue stolen cars. But due to pressure from the city's leaders, the regional divisions of the army confirmed at 15:30 their entry to remove the vehicle. But at the same time riots began in the town, causing the vehicle rescue operation to be postponed till Friday night at 21:00.

But even at 21:00 forces did not enter the town of Abu Dis, as Ituran announced a few minutes before, that the vehicle is moving, and left the b area towards Mishor Adumim. Police set up roadblocks to stop the vehicle, but the driver broke a barrier, stopping only at Hizma checkpoint near Pisgat Ze'ev in Jerusalem."


Bernstein spent all this time in Beitar and did not know about the proceedings. Only after Shabbos the police station Chief Superintendent Eyal Atia called him, and announced that the car was located after a chase and is now at the police station in Neve Yaakov.

"I did not know how to properly appreciate the police, I was surprised by the personal attitude," he says.

'בחדרי' גם ברשתות החברתיות - הצטרפו!