Dekel Swissa z”l was born and raised in Moshav Bar Giyora, a community in central Israel. In his early years, Dekel developed his value for family and friends, making sure to spend abundant time with them in addition to his responsibilities and hobbies. He enjoyed reading, learning Torah, playing guitar, running, and hiking. Dekel appreciated nature’s quiet and would often take long hikes equipped with his special black coffee.
But for Dekel, life was about more than leisure. Committed to defending his country, Dekel aspired towards a leadership role in the IDF. As early as high school, Dekel attended the Command Military Academy in Haifa, where he excelled and humbly accepted multiple awards.
Dekel then volunteered for a year of service in America. He traveled from his small moshav to the city of Atlanta as a Shinshin for the Jewish Federation of Greater Atlanta. Throughout the 2018-2019 school year, he worked as part of the first pair of Shinshinim at AJA and formed connections with the Atlanta Jewish community.
Morah Tali Dan, Dekel’s AJA supervisor, noted that he spent time with “every single facet” of the broader Atlanta Jewish community. In addition to working at AJA, Dekel attended every shul in Toco and led Israeli scouts. “I don’t know how he did it,” added Morah Tali, an Israel emissary herself. “For me being a shlicha in Atlanta, I know that in one year to be able to touch so many different communities, that’s a special gift.”
Dekel’s efforts to reach a variety of groups and organizations leaves a clear message to Atlanta, according to Morah Tali. “We are one family,” she said, because “we all have him in common.”
Dekel could connect to so many on a personal level: his students, his mentors and supervisors, and his host families. “He made you feel comfortable. He made you feel important,” said Mr. Neil Kalnitz, whose family hosted Dekel. “When I was with him, that was the most important thing to him at the time.”
Dekel inspired many Atlanta community members. Mr. Kalnitz said Dekel showed him “how to see the good in people” and “look past the surface.” “That’s the message,” he said. “Get to know people, understand them, find the positives, just be friendly, and [accept] everybody.” Dekel’s positivity spread, guided by his motto “don’t forget to smile when you wake up in the morning.” He believed that there is no reason to dwell on life’s obstacles or engage in lashon ha’rah (negative talk about another) and instead advocated for starting everyday with positivity.
In addition to friendliness and optimism, Dekel championed proactive leadership. “We all learned how to do things with modesty and dignity, but also to do it,” said Mrs. Marcy Kalnitz. “To take action, to be a positive leader.”
Just as much as Dekel inspired Atlanta, Atlanta inspired him. “He would exude sweetness, kindness, and inquisitiveness,” said Rabbi Adam Starr of Congregation Ohr HaTorah. “He really wanted to soak up everything and understand Atlanta, understand our community, and understand how Judaism worked here in what was for him a foreign country.”
For example, Dekel discovered the custom of blessing one’s children at a Friday night meal in Rabbi Starr’s home. In his diary, where Dekel reflected on his time in Atlanta, he wrote that he planned to bless his own children some day. Dekel also wrote about aiming high, trying your hardest, and learning from everyone and every experience.
“He took back and incorporated the lessons and the things that he wanted to from the school, the community, America,” said Mrs. Kalnitz. “There’s something to learn from everyone if you stop and take a moment to really sit back and learn and look.”
Dekel wrote about aiming high, trying your hardest, and learning from everyone and every experience.
Motivated by his time in Atlanta, Dekel sought to grow spiritually and strengthen his faith by studying at the army preparatory yeshiva Bnei David Eli. Dekel strongly believed in studying Torah while also serving the land of Israel.
Taking his experiences from yeshiva, Dekel enlisted in the Maglan, an elite commando unit. He completed the Officer’s Training Course and then took command of a unit of Golani Brigade soldiers. He trained new soldiers and guided them both as a friend and mentor.
Dekel soon decided to stay in the army as his life’s mission. “It is a very difficult life to lead,” said Morah Tali. “I think that Dekel was born to serve, to be able to see others before you see yourself, other people’s needs, other people’s wants.” At the closing ceremony of his soldiers’ training course, Dekel committed to do his best to return them home safely.
On the morning of October 7th, Dekel was the only commander on base near Kibbutz Be’eri. When it was attacked, many soldiers survived by hiding in safe rooms. Dekel, however, took responsibility for his soldiers still under fire, bringing them to safety. He continued perservering to protect his unit and left the shelter never to return.
Although Dekel’s life was tragically cut short at 23, his memory is still alive. On Yom Hazikaron at AJA, Morah Michal Lashansky’s 9th and 10th grade girls Chumash class opened “The Dekel Project,” an exhibit displaying Dekel’s life. The students transformed a classroom into important locations from Dekel’s life such as his bedroom, boardroom, and yeshiva, and visitors experienced them while AJA students shared details about him. The project aimed to share his stories, legacy, and wisdom with members of AJA’s community.
Morah Tali said that honoring his memory is important for its longevity, since Dekel volunteered at AJA when current high schoolers were still in middle or lower school. “Most don’t even know who he is and have never heard of him or met him,” Morah Tali said. “And yet his story and his life and his values are a part of them.”
Sophomore Noemi Bader is one student who made that happen through the Dekel Project. Noemi helped create the Atlanta portion of the exhibit and said that through it she learned more about Dekel’s life. Beyond personal learning, it “felt nice to teach people about what I learned about his legacy,” Noemi said. “People really liked it.”
Another student, sophomore Devorah Attali, helped build the mock cheder ochel (cafeteria) where Dekel ate with his unit. She learned that Dekel “always put his soldiers first.” Despite his commander position and accomplishments, Devorah appreciated that Dekel remained humble.
The content for the exhibit came largely from an interview that Morah Lashansky’s class conducted with Dekel’s father and brother when they visited Atlanta in April. The visit allowed Dekel’s family to witness the impact that he had on Atlanta and that Atlanta had on him firsthand as well as share Dekel’s legacy at AJA and other local institutions. Dekel’s father and brother participated in slow shira and a musical havdalah at Ohr HaTorah and joined around 150 others on AJA’s “Team Dekel” at the annual Daffodil Dash, all activities that Dekel came to love in Atlanta yet unfamiliar to his family until they recently came to experience them.
The Dekel Project fills a debt of gratitude owed to a valued community member, according to Rabbi Starr. “For the life of a young man that was cut short, the least we can do is honor his memory,” he said, “and in that way, keep his soul close [to] inspire others.” The exhibit also brings comfort to Dekel’s family, said Rabbi Starr, who walked through it with Dekel’s aunt, uncle, and cousins on Yom Hazikaron. “To see the comfort that it brought them, to see how much we so far away from him can talk about him and keep his memory alive, was one of the most memorable experiences of my life.”
The exhibit was meaningful for Dekel’s host family, too. “We want people to understand how special he was,” said Mr. Kalnitz. “He had a maturity beyond his years.”
After walking through the exhibit, the Kalnitzs’ shared stories about Dekel with the student presenters from Morah Michal’s class. “I asked Dekel one time,” said Mrs. Kalnitz, “What did he see as one of the biggest differences between Israel and America?” He answered, “‘Americans live to work, and in Israel, they work to live.’” Mrs. Kalnitz said that this distinction guided Dekel, who “enjoyed going and doing fun things” at the same time as recognizing “a seriousness to life.”
Morah Tali concluded with the Hebrew phrase, “Hashem lokeach et hatovim b’yoter” (God takes the very best). “The world has lost an amazing human being, but if we can make his legacy alive… if we can learn the life lessons that he was able to learn in 23 very very short years, [it] can comfort us,” she said. “As long as we talk about him, as long as we quote him, as long as we think about him, then Dekel’s essence… will be alive in this world. That is what keeping his memory alive is all about.”
—Morah Michal Lashansky’s 9/10 girls Chumash class contributed to this article.
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