Commando Yael: She works at a hospital, volunteers as an ambulance driver and her son is fighting in Gaza.
People like Yael Kakon are said to need more than 24 hours a day. Four times a week, after she finishes the morning shift at the Galilee Medical Center in Nahariya where she works, she volunteers as an ambulance driver and medic at Magen David Adom.
She returns to her house in the evacuated town of Shlomi, near the border with Lebanon, late at night. Despite it being an evacuated ‘ghost town’ for the past two months, she lives there with her husband, Gad, who also works at the medical center. It’s clear to the two of them that due to their essential work they will not leave their home. And that’s not all. They also have eight children (four of them foster children), one of whom is a soldier fighting in Gaza.
Kakon, 50, works at the medical center as support staff in the urology department. With the outbreak of the war, the department was moved to the underground complex, which makes the work especially challenging, yet interesting. In the afternoon, at the end of the morning shift, she gets to her ambulance and starts another long shift of saving lives and providing first aid to the sick and the wounded in the surrounding towns. And if her schedule isn’t packed enough, she is also studying health systems administration at Ramat Gan College.
“Due to my David Magen Adom shifts, I only work morning shifts at the hospital,” she explains. “In the ward, I am part of the nursing sector and take care of the patients as if they were my parents or siblings. I basically do almost everything a nurse does, except give medicine. I am like their parent.”
“During these days, working in an underground complex is not easy, and I’m sure I will remember this period for the rest of my life,” she adds.
Dalia Tedgi, director of nursing at the Galilee Medical Center, testifies that “together with her colleagues in the urology department, Yael has been working for the past two months under challenging conditions in the underground complex,” and she is full of pride in the dedicated worker.
At the end of her shift at Magen David Adom, at 11 p.m., Kakon goes home with the ambulance. “I’m on call 24/7, and even at work I received permission that if, God forbid, something happens, I can leave everything and drive away with the ambulance. My children and grandchildren are scattered in the northern region and my son, Or, is a reservist serving in Gaza and I pray every day that he is healthy and returns safely.”
