Former "hilltop youth" saves Arab's life at Damascus Gate

Times of Israel   In Jerusalem, a city too often divided among religious and nationalist lines, unusual heartwarming encounters do take place from time to time.

Haim Attias, a resident of the Mitzpe Yericho settlement and volunteer at the “Hatzala” emergency medical organization, and Haitham Azloni, an Arab resident of East Jerusalem, met Thursday for the first time since Attias saved Azloni’s life last week. 

Azloni was somehow electrocuted while sitting next to a stall in the Arab bazaar near the Old City’s Damascus Gate. His heart had stopped beating and “he was dead,” a local Arab man who witnessed the scene recalled. “I couldn’t bear to look. I walked away.” [...]

No one came to help me, none of the brothers, no Arabs. Only one Orthodox Jewish man came to help me,” Azloni’s brother recounted him as saying upon his awakening. “I want to meet the man that saved me.” [...]

Attias, who described himself as a former rebellious “hilltop youth,” said that when it comes to helping others, nationalities and religious affiliation must never stand in the way. [...]