The testimony of Ruthi Pazoelo, Najam's sister and daughter of Ovadia and Naomi:

My parents immigrated from Iraq in 1951, together with my older brother Najam, who was then 3 years old (born in 1948). They lived in Kiryat Ono transit camp.

In the summer of 1951, on a very hot day, Najam felt a little unwell and my father decided to take him to Dajani Hospital.

At the hospital, they decided to admit him and told my father to leave him there and come back in a few days. Father looked through the window at Najam, as a kind of farewell, saw him jump on the hospital bed and shout "Baba Baba"(father, father).

When Dad returned to the hospital to take Najam, he was told the boy had passed away. How come he died? He only felt a little unwell. When my father asked to see the body, he was not shown. When he asked to know where the child was buried, they pointed to a field of thorns in front of the hospital and said: “Here!”

This story accompanied and accompanies our family all these years. He is the eldest son of my parents. Besides him, we are three more brothers and two sisters, I am the fourth sister. Mother, as a result of the grief, was hospitalized, several times, in psychiatric hospitals and ended her life with a hole in her heart. Filled with sorrow.

My parents didn't talk much about it over the years, because it weighed heavily on them.

The turning point was when mother passed away and during the seven days’ mourning (Shiv’ah), I really interrogated my father. I asked him to tell me everything in details.

It was then, that we realized, that over the years, a draft order came on Najam's name and that defector catchers also came home, to check why he didn't show up. That was a difficult situation for my mother: my third brother was given the same name - Najam Zion. He was 14 years old at the time and at home with my mother, when the defector catchers came and my mother did not initially connect, that they were looking for her eldest son, who disappeared, and did not understand, why they were recruiting a 14-year-old boy. Only later did she realize that they had come to look for her eldest son.

My parents, may their memory be blessed, were good and naive people who did not contact any committee, social security or any other entity.

I'm doing everything possible to find my brother. We submitted a request to the Ministry of Interior, to locate an address, based on an ID number and we received an address in Musrara, Jerusalem.

We went to check and there was no such address, in practice.

In addition, I sent his photo along with his ID number in several relevant WhatsApp groups, hoping to find a clue.

We hope that the truth will come out and we will live to see a closure to this cycle.