Jacob Bentow (center left) standing with the rest of the Bentow family and his new green beret, given to him by Sergeot Uzan, at a memorial for Dan Uzan following Jacob’s beret ceremony on July 5, 2023. Photo: Provided
A young soldier in the Israel Defense Forces told The Algemeiner this week he feels “guided” by a Jewish security guard who died while protecting his family from a murderous Islamist terrorist attack in Copenhagen in 2015.
Jacob Bentow, 22, serves in the IDF’s Nahal Brigade. Originally for Copenhagen, Denmark, his family moved to Israel a year and a half ago. He recently completed eight months of intensive training in the Nahal Brigade and on July 5 had a beret ceremony, where each soldier received a light green beret that marks the end of their training and the beginning of their service as IDF soldiers.
To his surprise, the father of Dan Uzan — a Jewish volunteer security guard who died protecting the Bentow family in 2015 outside Copenhagen’s Great Synagogue — attended the ceremony and handed Bentow his new beret instead of it being handed over by the soldier’s commander. Bentow previously invited the senior Uzan to attend the event and do the honors, but was unsure if the latter would actually show up, the soldier told The Algemeiner.
On Feb. 15, 2015, an attack took place outside the Great Synagogue while Bentow and his family were inside the temple celebrating his sister’s bat mitzvah. Uzan was stationed in front of the synagogue and shot at close range by a radical Islamist terrorist, who just a few hours earlier attacked a cultural event marking the Charlie Hebdo massacre, where one person was killed. The terrorist was shot to death by police the next morning and Uzan, who was 37 at the time, was buried in a Jewish cemetery in Denmark in front of a monument that honors victims of the Theresienstadt Ghetto.
The Bentow and Uzan families were friends in Denmark, they even did Shabbat dinners together, but the terrorist attack brought them even closer, Bentow said. Both Bentow and Uzan’s father, Sergeot Uzan, told The Algemeiner they now feel more like family than friends.
“It all made sense to be honest,” Bentow said. “It’s been a long and tough eight months [of training] and I feel like it was a full circle moment. I feel a little bit like I was guided [by Dan] to do the Army. And every time I have a tough week in the Army, I can always think of Dan and I would know OK, he is looking after me and I know that I’ll be able to do this.”
He added that the main reason why he decided to enlist in the IDF, and why his family chose to move to Israel, was the 2015 terrorist attack that he said shook him to his core. He was 15 when the incident happened outside his sister’s bat mitzvah celebration.
“I remember us getting ready [for] the bat mitzvah and going to the synagogue and then I remember a guy coming in, screaming, all white in his face, that we have to go in the basement,” he recalled. “They didn’t tell us what was happening but you felt that something was wrong and you felt it in your gut. It was only afterwards that we could comprehend what was happening.”
“After the terrorist attack that happened, it was really tough for me and my family and I wanted to do something,” he added. “I wanted to have somewhere where me, and my family, and Jews can always feel protected and secure, and [I can] be a part of something bigger than me … It was also about me protecting what I also call home. We’d been to Israel 20, 30 times when I was a kid and every time we came, someone protected us so we could go to the beach and go enjoy Israel. And I feel like now it’s my turn to [help] protect the country.”
Uzan’s father, 78, has been living in Israel for the past five months. He first came to the country when the Casuarina Tree Circle at the KKL-JNF National Tree Arboretum in Israel’s Ilanot Forest was dedicated in memory of the late security guard.
The elder Uzan had only words of praise when talking about Bentow with The Algemeiner and why he wanted to be there to give the latter his new beret. He said Bentow, like his son, is voluntarily risking his risk to protect the Jewish community and that is the biggest contribution mankind can make.
He added that he and his wife fully supported their son when he came to them at the age of 17, just a few years younger than Bentow is now, and said he wanted to be a volunteer security guard in the Jewish community. He went on to help protect Denmark’s Jewish population for 20 years until he was killed.
“Yaakov is the same as Dan, he fights for other people and he is courageous,” said Uzan. “He shows his value as a human being for doing it in free will [as a volunteer] like Dan. He shows his courage to be a soldier for Israel, for the Jewish people and for the Jewish identity.”
“Dan’s values is to make people around him feel protected, secure [and] loved,” he added. “I am sure Yaakov [will] carry on his values because he’s doing it from his own soul. He’s not doing it to get a medal or to show off himself. He’s a humble person who loves his family and the people around him. That’s the most strength you can get from someone, when they’re doing it from their heart and soul. And Dan did it from his soul too. He had a strength — physically and morally — and he loved people. To contribute is the most valuable part for our life.”
It’s been almost eight and a half years since the terrorist attack in Copenhagen and Bentow said he and his family still keep the Uzan family in their thoughts and prayers. “Whenever we do something as a family and as Jews, like Shabbat, we pray for him [Dan] and his family,” he explained to The Algemeiner.
The elder Uzan said he feels heartened that Bentow still feels close to his son, and that it shows the bond between the two friends.
“That’s the meaning truly loving somebody. Love gives a feeling that you cannot stop,” he said.
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