Today’s story will be about a dedicated volunteer, David. Here’s why he joined United Hatzalah.

David is now the manager of customer services at a hi-tech company, but ten years ago, he worked as a bartender in Mike’s Place, a popular bar in Tel Aviv. On that fateful day on April 30, 2003, when the bar was the site of a suicide attack, David was there inside. He felt the shock, he heard the screams, and he saw the wounded and dying people. As he tried to treat an injured friend, trying to remember a long-forgotten first-aid course, David experienced a crippling, desperate helplessness that he will never forget. People’s lives were in his hands and yet he didn’t know what to do.

Two days later David told his boss he was starting a first response course. Since then he has been in the medical field, saving lives as a first responder. By receiving an ambucycle, his response time was reduced dramatically and he is constantly able to save lives.

A couple of weeks ago, David’s United Hatzalah walkie talkie alerted him to a possible terror attack – a car drove into a bar. The location was all too familiar -Mike’s Place. Heart pounding, your partner leapt on your ambucycle and roared to the scene. He was there in 2 minutes. An elderly gentleman had reversed instead of driving forward and the car had shot backwards into the tables at the front of the bar. The scene was eerily similar to the terrible incident over ten years earlier – the broken glass, the destroyed bar-front, his boss, crowds of people. But this time he was an experienced medic and he knew exactly what to do, how to help.