Shlomi Mark walking down his sister, Orit, to the Chuppah

Tragedy befalls the late Rabbi Miki Mark’s family as they mourn the loss of the eldest son, and are once again plunged into sorrow

Thousands on Monday attended the funeral of Shlomi Mark who died days after he crashed his motorcycle on his way to work at the Prime Minister’s office on Friday evening.. Shlomi was only 29 years old, husband to Yiska and father of three children, the youngest only three months old.
Shlomi was the oldest son of the late Rabbi Michael “Miki” Mark who was murdered by Palestinian terrorists in July 2016, his wife Chavi and two sons injured. Rabbi Mark was the director of the yeshiva at Otniel.

“My heart is shattered,, I am lost,” wrote his sister Orit on her Facebook page shortly after her brother was pronounced dead at the Soroka Hospital where doctors fought for his life. ”Can someone help me? How do you eulogize Shlomi , who could do anything? To my big brother who was everything…my heart is simply shattered, I feel lost in a complex world, never have I felt such deep despair. Two days I sat next to you, stroking your beautiful face, holding your warm hands, I did not want to let go of. I looked at you and plead for you to get up. I am sitting and looking at this page for over an hour, and can’t find the words, I am in denial. …It is totally inconceivable. There is a limit to how much I can suffer…Father, Shlomi, I am jealous of the hug you will give each other up there.”

After his father’s death, Shlomi took it upon himself to care for his mother and siblings, becoming the backbone of the family, a pillar of strength.

Shlomi’s wife Yiska was only eleven years old when she lost her father Eliyahu Ben-Ami in a terrorist attack in 2000. The late Rabbi Mark and his wife Chavi took Yiska’s family in and the Rabbi became a surrogate father to her.

Shortly after Rabbi Mark’s murder, Yiska and Shlomi gave a joint interview and spoke about how terror had engulfed their lives. The footage was broadcast again with the news of Shlomi’s death. The couple sat in their garden holding hands as Yiska spoke of Rabbi Mark and how he and his wife took her family in. “He was a second father to me,” she said adding his murder took her back to the day when she was told of her father’s death. “Until I saw him in the hospital, with a sheet covering him, I did not believe it,” she said. It was the Mark family that encompassed her and her family and helped her to come to terms with his death.

“Shlomi is my rock, he is my strength,”Yiska said. Shlomi who sat by her side clutching her hand, said after his father’s death they chose not to seek out vengeance but to continue Rabbi Mark’s path and move forward.

“The Nation of Israel stands at your side in your dark time. It is simply inconceivable the pain that has befallen this family,” Education Minister Naftali Bennett said of Shllomi’s passing. Yochai Damri head of the Hebron Hills Regional Council said the entire community is shocked and saddened. “Shlomi from the time he joined the army to this day, chose to devote his best years to the security of the State of Israel as an officer and later in the security establishment. Our heart is broken.”
With Shlomi’s death Yiska who has known so much sorrow in her life will have to find the strength to overcome her devastating pain and care for her three children who will now grow up without a father, just as she did.

Please send emails of support to Yiska and the family letting them know they are not alone to info@onefamilyfund.org. OneFamily will forward them