Today has been a hard day.
I woke up to the news of a shooting in Washington, D.C., that killed two Israeli Embassy staffers. Having worked with the embassy on different projects, my mind began to race with possibilities.
When I saw the picture of the young couple, my heart sank. Though I didn’t immediately recognize their names, the young man’s face seemed to recall a memory. I racked my brain, trying to pinpoint where I had seen him before and trying figure out if we had had any previous interactions.
After receiving a text from a colleague, I suddenly realized where I had seen his face––the Children’s Memorial at Yad Vashem, the Holocaust museum in Jerusalem. I broke and began to weep.
In February of this year, Bishop Roberts Stearns and Rev. Samuel Rodriguez co-led a trip to Israel for Hispanic pastors and Christian leaders. It was a joint endeavor between Eagles’ Wings, the Israel Christian Nexus, and the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference. I was handling logistics for the trip, which included finding a Spanish-speaking tour guide. Working with our travel team, Bishop Stearns and I interviewed Daniel Lischinsky as a candidate.
Daniel immediately made an impression. He is originally from Argentina (thus the Spanish) and has a grasp on several languages. He is Jewish and Israeli. He also follows Jesus with every fiber of his being. As we began to discuss faith, you could hear the affection in his voice whenever he said, “The Lord Jesus.”
Daniel accepted the role as our tour guide and weeks later he met our group at Ben Gurion airport. We spent a lot of time together and grew close over the ten day tour. Navigating itinerary changes, Tel Aviv traffic, and the pressures of touring in the midst of war has a way of forging a fast friendship.
One week into the trip, Daniel and I found ourselves sitting together outside of the Children’s Memorial at Yad Vashem. We were waiting on the group of pastors to finish the larger museum and meet us at the memorial before entering together. After talking shop, our conversation turned to more personal areas.
I showed Daniel pictures of my family, giving him the names of my four kids and telling him what each of them is like. Daniel did the same––showing me a family picture and then individual photos of his children, including his son, Yaron Lischinsky. He described how Yaron had moved around to different Israeli embassies and his most recent appointment was Washington, D.C.
As Daniel told me about Yaron, you could see the pride in his eyes. I responded that I would like to meet Yaron the next time work took me to the embassy. Tragically, I never got that chance.
It was Yaron’s face I looked at today in the news articles about the D.C. shooting. I first saw it on his father’s phone in Jerusalem, standing outside the Yad Vashem Children’s Memorial, which commemorates the 1.5 million children murdered during the Holocaust. Now, his face is flooding the social media feed on my phone because the same genocidal hatred of the Nazis motivated a gunman to fire at a young Jewish couple. This time, instead of, “Heil Hitler,” the perpetrator hurled, “Free Palestine.”
The irony is that when Daniel originally told me about his son’s placement in D.C., he seemed to have a sense of relief. Other children and family members were serving in the IDF. Yaron seemed safely out of the line of direct fire, serving in the United States.
What I can’t shake from my mind today is the look that must be in Daniel’s eyes. In February, his eyes would water in tenderness and joy whenever we talked about faith or family––anything close to his heart. I can’t imagine the tears that must fill those eyes today whenever he thinks about or looks at the face of his son, Yaron Lischinsky.
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Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Lynn Milgrim who were shot and killed as they left an event at the Capital Jewish Museum, pose for a picture at an unknown location, in this handout image released by Embassy of Israel to the U.S. on May 22, 2025. Embassy of Israel to the USA via X/Handout via REUTERS THIS IMAGE HAS BEEN SUPPLIED BY A THIRD PARTY. NO RESALES. NO ARCHIVES. MANDATORY CREDIT
