About a year and a half ago, Icha Altman donated a kidney to his good friend from the yeshiva, Yair Shapira. In the Haredi rooms’
It would have seemed like another joyous covenant joy and an eight-day-old baby entering into the covenant of our father Abraham, but quite a few of those present today (Sunday) in a covenant celebrated in Petah Tikva shed a tear and witnessed an exciting closing circle, in which the father and son and godfather were partners.
The story begins in the years of the two’s freedom. Yair Shapira and Icha Altman studied together at Rabbi Lupolianski’s Nahalat Yair Yeshiva in Mitzpat and even studied in Chavruta for a long time more than a decade ago. When they got to their point, they both got married and each went his own way, when they both established their home in the city of Petah Tikva.
Shortly after his marriage, Yair began to suffer from kidney failure and as a result began to undergo exhausting dialysis treatments, which lasted for two days. Icha, his good friend and neighbor to the same city, camel in his heart and decided early on that he would do anything to help his friend in his suffering even at the cost of a kidney donation.
The friend did not delay, aiming for a goal and began to go through the stages of the comprehensive tests, in order to make sure that he was a suitable donor – and indeed, with the help of Dashmia, a match was found. A deadline for the transplant was set and the two members, the donor and the donor, began to prepare for it.
The joy of the covenant this morning. Photo: Michi Broadman.
A short time has passed, but then Icha gets an urgent and unexpected phone call. On the line a medical source informs him that there is a woman who has been waiting for five years for a kidney donation and in fact he has been found the right donor who can help her end the ongoing suffering.
He was really shocked and asked to consult with his friend Yair who is waiting for a transplant and at the same time asked his rabbi. Despite the difficulty, they decided together that he would contribute to the same woman and in any case his friend would be given priority in giving precedence. But after another series of tests to match, it turned out that there was a missing match and as a result they returned to the original plan – and Icha donated a kidney to his friend Yair and gave him a new life.
A year and a half later, Yair Shapira was born at a good and successful time. Today he entered into the covenant of our ancestor Abraham, when in godparents the honor is none other than the good friend and the one who only about a year and a half ago gave him a new life, the donor Icha Altman.
And I will tell you in your image my life, and I will tell you in your image my life.