Hasidic Brooklyn Baby Named for Three Murdered Israeli Teens

By JTA July 15, 2014

A Brooklyn baby was named Eyal Gilad Naftali in memory of the three murdered Israeli teens.

The name was announced at the baby’s bris on Monday, according to the NRG news website. He is the son of Yankee and Bina Teitelbaum, who live in the Crown Heights neighborhood.

Reports that circulated on social media saying that a set of triplets was named for the boys proved to be false.

The teens who were kidnapped and killed last month are Eyal Yifrah, 19, and Gilad Shaar and Naftali Fraenkel, both 16.

Two of the couple’s other five children also were named for terror victims. Their daughter Shalhevet was named for Shalhevet Pass, an infant who was killed by a Palestinian sniper in 2001, and their son Ehud Daniel was named for the captive and murdered Israeli soldier Ehud Goldwasser, whose body was recovered from Hezbollah in 2008, and Daniel Agami, an American soldier killed in 2007 in Iraq.

“Those three boys are our family, even more now that we gave our own son their names,” Bina Teitelbaum said in an interview cited by NRG. “We called him this name because we want him to continue the unity the boys have brought to all of Israel — united in prayer, and then reunited in grief.”

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