"Here is Kod, my love, over": Battalion Commander Dor Ben-Simhon fell in Lebanon, his wife Ariel sets out on his path

"Dor, my love, you were a commander who was first and foremost a human being. I used to walk with my head held high, saying that I am Davash's wife. My love, I promise you that I will be strong because that is how we were raised. I promise you that the girls will know you. So for the last time, Kod, my love, here is Kod, your beloved - I love you and will love you forever. Over." With these words, on the military radio that so characterized their shared life, Lieutenant Colonel Ariel Ben-Simhon said goodbye to her husband, Lieutenant Colonel Dor Ben-Simhon.

Davash, as everyone knew him, fell in Lebanon as the commander of the 52nd Armored Battalion. Their story is not only a story of bereavement and heroism, but a story of a partnership built between tanks and command posts, healthy competition for ranks, and one fateful choice that changed their life path forever.

The race for the rank of Lieutenant Colonel

Ariel and Dor's partnership was always in uniform. They met in the army eight years ago and became a couple of career officers who shared not only a home but also a common professional language. "The truth is that I was winning most of the time," Ariel smiles as she recalls the competition for ranks. "When we got married, I was a Major and he was only a Captain. He didn't even agree to be photographed with me in uniform at first, I had to 'steal' photos. In the end, he agreed to do wedding photos in uniform."

The wheel turned when Dor received the rank of Lieutenant Colonel before Ariel. "I thought he would have more time to be a Lieutenant Colonel before me," she says with pain. "I had the privilege of pinning the rank on him, at least that. But now jealousy is eating me up - not because of the rank, but because of the time lost."

In the army, everyone knew Battalion Commander Davash and Deputy Battalion Commander Ariel. Ariel served as deputy commander of a combat intelligence battalion, a demanding field position. As she walks around the sector today, among the fighters and officers, one cannot miss the admiration for her. "She is like the mother of the battalion," testifies one of the officers. "Everything is on her, she closes all the gaps for us. Professionally, she is a hundred out of a hundred."

Dor, stay a little longer

One of the sensitive and complex points in the story is Dor's decision to continue his service. Dor Ben-Simhon wanted to be released. He dreamed of working in non-formal education, of a calmer life. In their conversations, it was Ariel who urged him to stay. "At the end of every position, Dor said it was his last position," she says. "And I told him: Dor, a little more, we need to stay."

She wanted them to experience the command path together, for the life they built to continue at the same pace. That year, Dor was studying at the Command and Staff College, a position with daily returns home that allowed him to be a full-time father to Ayala (3) and Gaia (a year and a half). He fell in love with it. "He called me and said: Ariel, this arrangement suits me. I will be at home and you will be in the field, I am ready for this for the rest of my life."

Ariel was frightened by the possibility of him being released and told him: "Stay, be a battalion commander." Today, despite everything, she does not regret it. "I am at peace with it. These were the two most beautiful months of his service. He shone, he felt significant, he was in it a million percent. He fell at his peak."

The fall of the fourth battalion commander

The 52nd Armored Battalion has gone through severe upheavals since October 7. Three battalion commanders were wounded one after another, and Dor was called up from his studies to be the fourth battalion commander to step under the stretcher. He led the battalion for two months in Lebanon, including crossing the Litani River, until the terrible moment when his tank was hit by an explosive drone. Dor was killed on the spot along with his three crew members.

Dor grew up in Kibbutz Beit HaShita, one of six brothers - all combat soldiers, five of them tankers. On his chest, he tattooed the landscape of the Harod Valley fields, the view that was reflected from the yard of the house in the kibbutz. In Beit HaShita, bereavement is part of the local DNA since the Yom Kippur War and the song "The Wheat Grows Again." Dor's mother, Iris, said that the preoccupation with the army was always there and that they had a dark humor that perhaps they would not return from battle. This dark humor that accompanied Dor's life was also in his WhatsApp group with friends from his class. The group was called "Soon we will become a grove" - when a kibbutz member falls in battle, his family members plant a grove in his memory.

"Dor knew it could happen," says Ariel. "He even wrote that he already knew where he wanted his grove." In the end, it was Ariel who chose the place for him - a 360-degree observation point over the kibbutz and the valley he loved so much.

The knock on the door and the decision to continue

The news reached Ariel in the middle of the night. Strong knocks on the door when she was alone at home with the girls. "They shouted 'soldiers', and in my head I said - soldiers is safe, I'm opening," she recalls. But when she opened the door, she was asked if she was Dor's wife, and then she received the hardest news of all. "At first I didn't understand if I was in a dream or if it was really happening." When Major General Ori Gordin asked to enter, she already understood that it was real. Dealing with the girls was no less difficult. Ariel received instructions to speak to them explicitly. "I told them: Daddy died and he will not return anymore. Three-year-old Ayala understood immediately. She told me - but I want him to return. I told her that I do too, but it will not happen."

Despite the fresh bereavement, Ariel chose not to stop. She is now going to the battalion commander course, continuing the path that Dor did not get to finish. "I know he would have been proud of me for this choice. He would have told me: go for it, go and fulfill yourself." As she gets on the tractor in the kibbutz, in the same place where she took wedding photos in a wedding dress, Ariel looks at the view. It was the place of their dates, the place where Dor tried to impress her for the first time. "It worked with me," she says, "and since then I stayed." She stays in the kibbutz, stays in uniform, and continues forward - for herself, for the girls, and for her beloved Kod, who will not return from the field anymore.