Israel
Rebbetzen Lucy Dee saves five lives with posthumous organ donation
The British-Israeli mother and her daughters died after Palestinian gunmen attacked their car
April 11, 2023 17:01
The British-Israeli mother and her daughters died after Palestinian gunmen attacked their car
April 11, 2023 17:01British-Israeli mother Lucy Dee saved five lives by donating her organs after she was killed in a terror attack, her bereaved husband has revealed.
Dee was mortally wounded when Palestinian militants drove her car off the road in the Jordan Valley and riddled it with 20 bullets, killing her two daughters, Maia, 20, and Rina, 15, in the process.
After being flown to a Jerusalem hospital and undergoing surgery she survived in a coma for three days, before dying on Monday.
Before her funeral, which was held Tuesday in the Efrat settlement, south of Jerusalem, her organs were transplanted into five people.
“Since the tragedy, the remaining four of us in the family make decisions together,” Lucy’s husband Rabbi Leo Dee told the Times of Israel.
“When the doctors told us the news [that Lucy was brain dead] and also in a condition where she could donate her organs, I brought the family together and we decided to donate the organs.”
“Our rabbinical authority had checked out the halachot and explained to me that in her condition, it was perfectly acceptable — actually a mitzvah.
“Only the bones and tendons should not be donated, and everything else that is lifesaving should be given.
“Second, Lucy and I had discussed this before in the past, and the only reason we didn’t have [donation] cards was because we were worried that if we were abroad, and we had donation cards, that a hospital in England or Switzerland, for instance, might switch us off a little bit early in order to take organs in a non-halachic way.
“But in principle, she and I had no objection to giving organs.”
Dee’s heart was transplanted to a 51-year-old, her lungs to a 58-year-old, her liver to a 25-year-old, her kidney to a 58-year-old, and her other kidney to a 39-year-old.
Her corneas were also harvested and will be used at a later date.
Because of the circumstances of her death, however, Maia was not able to donate organs, Rabbi Dee said.
Lucy Dee’s organs were transplanted at Beilinson Hospital and Sheba Medical Center in Tel Aviv.
Doctor Dan Arvut, director of cardiothoracic surgery at Beilinson Hospital, said: “The act of this noble family is a point of light in the darkness, and they saved many lives.”
Doctor Eviatar Nesher, director of the transplant department at Beilinson Hospital said: "I have been transplanting for many years and am very moved by the strength of the donating family, the unimaginable nobility at the time of such a horrible tragedy.”
The Israeli Defence Forces have launched a manhunt for the attackers after Palestinian security forces discovered the car apparently used in the attack abandoned in the West Bank city of Nablus.
The IDF believe the terrorists are currently hiding in the north of the territory, the Times of Israel reported.