Sapira Shoshana Yulzari-Yaffe

Jan 5, 2003 - Sapira Shoshana Yulzari-Yaffe, 46, of Bat Yam was one of 23 people killed when two suicide bombers blew themselves up on a pedestrian mall in Tel Aviv's Naveh Sha'anan neighborhood near the old central bus station.

Fatah's Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades claimed responsibility for the attack, which apparently was assisted by Islamic Jihad.

Yulzari-Yaffe was waiting for a bus on her way home from work in an insurance company when the terrorists struck. She had decided to leave work early in order to spend more time with her two-year-old grandson, Roi.

"That boy was her whole life," said a relative. "She loved him so much, and so when she heard that her daughter was coming with him for a visit, she hurried to get home."

"She was a marvelous person with a true joy of life. Her smile was her calling card," said a neighbor, Mazal Asraf. She related that a week before the attack Yulzari-Yaffe had organized the neighbors to clean out their building's bomb shelter in case of a missile strike by Iraq.

Sapira Shoshana Yulzari-Yaffe was buried in the Holon Cemetery. She is survived by her parents, three siblings, two children, and her grandson.