Elazar Wilensky, of blessed memory, a ninth-grade student at the ORT Ma’alot Yeshiva High School, has been identified as the teenager killed on Monday in the severe disaster on Ramim Ridge in northern Israel during an annual student field trip. His grief-stricken family remembered him with immense sorrow as “a brilliant young boy, full of joy and truly exceptional.”
The tragedy occurred during an excursion by yeshiva students in the Ramim Ridge area when an unexploded piece of ammunition detonated. Elazar sustained critical, life-threatening injuries and was subsequently pronounced dead. Numerous other students were wounded in the blast and were evacuated to regional medical centers across northern Israel.
According to the latest medical updates, four of the victims remain hospitalized in serious condition at Rambam Health Care Campus in Haifa, Ziv Medical Center in Safed, and the Galilee Medical Center in Nahariya. An additional 19 casualties continue to receive medical treatment for light-to-moderate injuries.
In the wake of the tragedy, the Ministry of Education enacted a series of urgent emergency protocols, chief among them the mandatory rerouting of all student trips scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday, October 13–14, away from the northern confrontation line and the northern Golan Heights to alternative routes. Simultaneously, safety guidelines were sharply reinforced across the board, placing heightened emphasis on the lethal danger posed by unexploded ordnance in open terrain.
Elazar’s tragic death has plunged his family, friends, and the broader yeshiva community into profound mourning, as medical teams continue to treat the injured victims fighting for their full recovery.