Sharaf, Dr. Raphael (Rafi)

Son of Nina and Osvald, he was born on August 14, 1952 in Tel Aviv. When he was a child, his family spent several years in Sydney, Australia, because of his father’s service as an economic attaché in the Israeli Embassy, ​​where Rafi also started elementary school. After four years of study, he returned with his family to Ramat Gan. Rafi continued to study at the elementary and junior high schools in Ramat Chen. While his father was an economic attaché and as a trade representative of Israel in Germany, Rafi went to study in a boarding school in the Netherlands. When he returned to Israel, he graduated from the Tel Aviv Municipal High School with a biological track. During his high school studies, Rafi was a star in the school’s drama department and participated in many plays throughout the country. He was even accepted into a military band, but he chose another way. Rafi excelled in his studies, and aspired to study at the university in the medical profession. In November 1970 he was accepted to the academic reserve and began studying at the Faculty of Medicine at Tel Aviv University. During his studies, Rafi fulfilled his obligations to the IDF as a security guard, and took a paramedic course in October 1971 and was promoted to Corporal. During his service in the battalion, Rafi met his future wife Yehudit, who was a paramedic in the battalion, and in 1978 he took part in Operation Litani, and in July 1979 he was promoted to the rank of lieutenant. When the Peace for Galilee war broke out, Rafi participated in many difficult battles, such as the battle on the Ali-Bahdun road and saved the lives of many soldiers under fire. On 17 Tamuz, July 8, 1982, about a month after the fighting began, Rafi was riding in a military vehicle, and the driver lost control of the vehicle, killing 3 officers, including Rafi, who was almost 30 years old when he died. He was laid to rest at the military cemetery in Kiryat Shaul in Tel Aviv. Rafi left behind a wife, son, parents and brother. The director of the internal division at Soroka Hospital, eulogized Rafi as “a promising doctor, a dear person and a loyal friend, a great loss to all of us.”