Tal Yehoshua Koren, 40, the Israeli diplomat’s wife who suffered spine and liver injuries in Monday’s bomb attack in New Delhi, today left for her country after she was discharged from a hospital in India’s capital city.
(Meanwhile Israel’s Counter Terrorism Bureau has warned of additional attempts to hurt Israelis worldwide, following the recent attacks in Thailand, Georgia and India. A senior official in the bureau urged Israelis who are currently overseas to be extra vigilant. The warning was based on information extracted during the interrogation of suspects arrested in connection to the terror attacks in New Delhi and Bangkok.)
According to doctors at the New Delhi hospital, Tal left for Israel in an air ambulance. She was whisked away from the back gate of the hospital today at 4.25 pm to avoid the media glare.
Tal underwent surgeries in the spine and liver. She sustained shrapnel injuries to her spine in the explosion. Doctors say she is experiencing partial paralysis in her lower extremities, but may regain full function.
Tal was on her way to pick her children up from the American Embassy School on Monday last when a lone motorcyclist attached a magnetic explosive device to her car and sped off. According to reports, she narrowly exited the vehicle as the bomb went off.
“Thank god the kids weren’t in the car,” was Tal’s first remark on reaching hospital. She has two children age 7 and 12. See here…
Meanwhile Tzafira Koren, Tal’s mother who arrived from Israel, said: “She (Tal) has been very, very brave throughout this incident. She is a hero for handling the situation so sensibly and has been raised to be a strong person. But right now, she is very weak physically.”
She said she spoke to her grandchildren. The family in Israel was informed of the terror attack by Tal’s husband, Israel’s defense attaché in New Delhi. See here…
Tal, who has lived in Delhi for four years, is very active in Jewish community activities here. The photo above is from her Facebook page.
Meanwhile Israeli intelligence officials were surprised by the attacks in India and Georgia. The picture regarding Thailand is less clear. A logical evaluation holds that the Iranians used local “subcontractors” in the three incidents this week. More here…
Swaraaj Chauhan describes his two-decade-long stint as a full-time journalist as eventful, purposeful, and full of joy and excitement. In 1993 he could foresee a different work culture appearing on the horizon, and decided to devote full time to teaching journalism (also, partly, with a desire to give back to the community from where he had enriched himself so much.)
Alongside, he worked for about a year in 1993 for the US State Department’s SPAN magazine, a nearly five-decade-old art and culture monthly magazine promoting US-India relations. It gave him an excellent opportunity to learn about things American, plus the pleasure of playing tennis in the lavish American embassy compound in the heart of New Delhi.
In !995 he joined WWF-India as a full-time media and environment education consultant and worked there for five years travelling a great deal, including to Husum in Germany as a part of the international team to formulate WWF’s Eco-tourism policy.
He taught journalism to honors students in a college affiliated to the University of Delhi, as also at the prestigious Indian Institute of Mass Communication where he lectured on “Development Journalism” to mid-career journalists/Information officers from the SAARC, African, East European and Latin American countries, for eight years.
In 2004 the BBC World Service Trust (BBC WST) selected him as a Trainer/Mentor for India under a European Union project. In 2008/09 He completed another European Union-funded project for the BBC WST related to Disaster Management and media coverage in two eastern States in India — West Bengal and Orissa.
Last year, he spent a couple of months in Australia and enjoyed trekking, and also taught for a while at the University of South Australia.
Recently, he was appointed as a Member of the Board of Studies at Chitkara University in Chandigarh, a beautiful city in North India designed by the famous Swiss/French architect Le Corbusier. He also teaches undergraduate and postgraduate students there.
He loves trekking, especially in the hills, and never misses an opportunity to play a game of tennis. The Western and Indian classical music are always within his reach for instant relaxation.
And last, but not least, is his firm belief in the power of the positive thought to heal oneself and others.