‘She was light itself’: Family, friends, unit mourn Rose Lubin

The length and color of Border Police officer Sgt. Rose Lubin’s hair could change from one day to the next – from purple to green to blue, from long to the waist, or completely shaved off; her socks never matched, her clothes were always a fashion statement, and she was the only student in her Atlanta, Georgia, high school to have lettered both in wrestling and cheerleading.

And she knew by the age of five that she wanted to go live in Israel and join the IDF. After graduating from high school, she did just that and joined the Border Police as a lone soldier in March 2022.

On Thursday, hundreds of people came with her family and friends to pay their last respects to the young woman who a month earlier took part in fending off Hamas terrorists attacking her adoptive home, Kibbutz Sa’ad.

On Monday morning, Lubin, 20, died from her wounds after being stabbed by a 16-year-old Palestinian in a terrorist attack near the Herod’s Gate entrance of Jerusalem’s Old City. Another border policeman was wounded in the attack.

A difficult funeral

Breaking down as he spoke at her funeral, her immediate commander said he wanted Lubin to know that he had been there with her, and that he had run to the scene as quickly as he could to change her fate.

“I want you to know that though my heart has been shattered, it will always love you and remember you,” he said.

There was no denying Lubin’s uniqueness, said her younger brother, Alec, as he eulogized her.

Despite her petite stature, he said, “She always stood tall, with her head held high. Rose was strange, but not so strange. She lived life free of judgment… She had the ability to block out the white noise that didn’t matter. She was the most understanding person I’ve ever met. She could take a bad situation and make it bearable. I will never have another person I can talk to like I did with Rose.”

Alec called her his “first friend” and “first best friend.” She loved to laugh and had an infectious laugh, he said, adding: “If Rose began to laugh, everyone began laughing.”

Members of Lubin’s family, including her parents, David and Robin, stepmother Stephanie, siblings Alec, Joseph, Lily, and half-brother Isaac, and people from the Atlanta Jewish community, including Rabbi Binyomin Friedman of Congregation Ariel flew to Israel for the funeral.

Her funeral was attended by hundreds of people, including her friends, family, and other Israelis. Her friends from Kibbutz Sa’ad also were present, along with her adoptive kibbutz parents, Idan and Tamer James, who recalled how the vibrant Lubin quickly became a part of their family.

It has become customary at the funerals of lone soldiers – who often have not been in the country long enough to have formed a large network of friends – for scores of Israelis to come to pay their respects, despite not having known them, to give support to the family.

“Rose was skipping and laughing, painting and writing,” Friedman said. “Rose was as bright as possible. She was light itself. She was bright and focused, and lived every moment with focus. In her few short decades of life, she gave her life absolutely to God and her people.”

If you ever had an interaction with Lubin, you knew you had something special, Friedman said.

“Rose was different; she was somewhere else,” he said.

Yifat, a relative from Moshav Bethlehem of Galilee, recalled how Lubin was always positive about her experience in the Border Police and never complained, saying everything was wonderful, and that she was exactly where she wanted to be.

Yifat learned how to cook not only kosher meals but also vegan dishes for Lubin.

“My heart is breaking now, but I know one day I will be able to look at your photos and hear your voice singing, and that is exactly what you would want,” she said.

Lubin's friends in Atlanta are mourning the young woman who they knew as "brave, strong and determined" and with the "most willpower" of anyone they knew.

"Rose was strong in every way I know. She was brave and determined, and no matter the circumstances, she brought joy to those around her. Her smile lit up a room," said her friend Chaya Freitag.

Freitag's sister, Esther, recalls Lubin's incredible willpower.

"She had the will to be the only female wrestler on a men's wrestling team," she said. "She had the will to change from a smart phone to a flip phone when she decided it was what was best for her and she had the will to be an amazing, kind person no matter what she was going through. There's no one quite like Rose and I miss her very much."

Lubin’s mother read an edited version of her bat mitzvah speech in which she had urged people to “care for each other and forgive each other.”

“Let’s make the world a better place, one apology at a time,” she had written.

Happiness, the young Lubin had written, is not something you search for; “it is something you find within the people and things you love.”

She had all the happiness she needed with her friends, family, and… the Internet, she wrote.

“We argue and get frustrated with each other, but we will always love each other,” Lubin had written about her relationship with her friends and family. “For all eternity I will love them and stand by them.”

Her father said he would miss most the Shabbat dinners with Rose, when the conversations were inspiring and full.

“She was everything the world needed and everything the world will need,” Alec said. “She was the best.”

The Jerusalem Post and OneFamily are working together to help support the victims of the Hamas massacre and the soldiers of Israel who have been drafted to ensure that it never happens again.

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