Cedarhurst man survives sniper shooting in Israel

A week to the day before the coordinated terrorist attacks in Paris, Cedarhurst resident Eli Borochov, 20, was one of two people shot by Arab snipers at the Cave of Patriarchs, a sacred Jewish site in Hebron, Israel.
The patriarchs and matriarchs of the Jewish religion are believed to be buried there, and the site is open for public viewing only four times a year.
Borochov, along with his father, Ronen, and brother, Yosef, 16, were walking up the steps to enter the cave when a sniper shot Eli in the upper thigh as a second sniper shot another young man. Borochov said the bullet lodged in his leg. The incident happened so fast, he recalled, that it seemed like just a minute or two after he was shot that emergency personnel arrived.
“I fell to the floor when I was shot,” he said. “Paramedics rushed me over to the medical tent triage center and attended to me right away. The Israeli Army escorted me to Shaare Tzedek Medical Center in Jerusalem. Once there, they put me on the operating table and 15 doctors surrounded me. Initially they did not find the bullet, as there was no exit wound. I was in a lot of pain but aware of what was going on.”
His brother was walking next to him when Eli was hit. “I was shaken up, nervous and traumatized,” Yosef said. “We’re never exposed to this type of situation here in America, and in Israel, security has always been good.”
The doctors eventually managed to extract the bullet. The Israeli police and military determined the location and identity of the shooter, according to Borochov, but had not apprehended the individual as of Monday.
“They found the casing,” said Borochov, a graduate of Davis Renov Stahler Boys High School in Woodmere. “They discovered it was a bullet made [by] Arabs, as they make their own bullets and rifles. They did a DNA test between the bullet and the casing to see if it was a match, and it was.”