FROM PIANO PLAYER TO UNDERCOVER SUPERCOP

Immigrant piano player honored by police for undercover 'kills'
A Russian immigrant turned Israeli policeman has won the Jewish state’s second-highest military honor. Known only by his initial, Y., the commander of the Border Police undercover unit called Yasam was awarded the Ribbon of Valor on Tuesday for a string of deadly counterterrorist missions in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Yasam is the Hebrew acronym for Police Reconnaissance Unit.

“I just did my job as best I knew how,” Y., a 30-year-old father of two, told Ma’ariv before the awards ceremony. “I wasn’t expecting a decoration.” Yasam usually seeks out recruits among Sephardi Jews who can pass for Palestinians and handle the rough world of covert operations. It might seem an odd home for Y., the piano-playing son of Muscovite academics who immigrated to Israel when he was 16. But he now has two dozen confirmed “kills” of terrorist fugitives to his name.

Y. described Yasam as his Zionist calling. “Even in the worst of times, we always knew Israel was the place for us,” he said. “The same went for the military. Even back in Russia, we would hear about the Israeli military. For me, it was a personal challenge to serve in it.”

“The Holocaust is very deeply ingrained in me. With time, I understood how terrible it was, and understood that we, the Jews, must know how to protect ourselves without asking questions or permission.”

Drafted into the Border Police, Y. performed so well that the commanders asked him to become an officer despite his faulty Hebrew. Then came the outbreak of Palestinian violence in 2000, and Y. found Arabic to be just as useful.

According to comrades, he is first to volunteer for the most dangerous missions in the grim alleyways of the refugee camps favored as hideouts by Palestinian gunmen. “There is something wrong with his fear instinct. It does not exist,” one said.