The Filipina carer Mary Anne Velasquez de Vera, 32, who was killed Saturday night in an Iranian missile strike on Tel Aviv, was “an angel on Earth,” according to her previous employers — her first upon arriving in Israel.
Barbara Wachspress and her sister Janice Prawer reached out to The Times of Israel because, they said, they wanted the public to know how special she was.
The young woman, who married another Philippine national two years ago, was the first fatality in Israel of the current war with Tehran.
She was “injured while selflessly assisting her patient to safety” during the Iranian missile attack, according to the Israeli embassy in Manila.
Velasquez de Vera was found in critical condition after the ballistic missile struck next to an apartment building in the coastal city. Paramedics pronounced her dead while rushing her to the hospital. She was identified by her husband.
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The woman she was caring for was extracted by rescue workers from the rubble alive.
Officers from the IDF Home Front Command search through the rubble of a damaged apartment building after an Iranian missile strike, in Tel Aviv, early March 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
Twenty-seven others were injured, including two in moderate condition and 25 who sustained light injuries in the attack.
Velasquez de Vera first came to Israel as a carer in 2019, and the first person she cared for was Doris Gurin. Gurin had recently immigrated, at the age of 89, together with daughter Prawer and her family, from Riverdale, Bronx. They lived in separate apartments in the same block in southern Beersheba, the city where Wachspress, Gurin’s second daughter, has lived since 1987.
The two daughters said their widowed mother, an independent but increasingly frail former nurse, had at first been reluctant to have a live-in carer, devoting herself at home to her mixed Shih Tzu-dachshund dog, Wally, nicknamed “Shidach.”
Once she accepted the need for help and co-interviewed potential candidates, she and her daughters chose Velasquez de Vera after the latter admitted to being a “puppy-lover.”
In this undated photo, Mary Anne Velasquez de Vera (right), who was killed in an Iranian missile attack on a Tel Aviv apartment building on March 1, plants a kiss on the cheek of Doris Gurin in the latter’s apartment. (Courtesy)
“Our mom was the first person that Mary Anne cared for in Israel,” Wachspress said. “She had the most wonderful smile. We brought her to our mom’s apartment, and they both started hugging, and it was love at first sight.”
“She doted on our mom like a loving granddaughter and called her Mother Earth,” said Prawer. “She also loved Wally. When he got sick, she would wake up in the middle of the night to make sure he took his pills.”
Prawer added, “She was part of our family, a ray of sunshine — so special, caring, and devoted.”
After coming home from a hospitalization, Gurin developed coronavirus.
“The agency recommended that Mary Anne leave, but she insisted on staying to care for Mom,” Wachspress said.
The sisters said the Filipino “saw auras.”
Mary Anne Velasquez de Vera (right), who was killed in an Iranian missile attack on a Tel Aviv apartment building on March 1, is seen with Doris Gurin, shortly before the latter died, at Soroka Medical Center in Beersheba, in December 2020. (Courtesy)
“She described seeing the white-haired figure of our late dad sitting on our mother’s sickbed,” they recalled.
After Gurin died of COVID-related complications, Velasquez de Vera said her spirit had visited her in a dream and been present at her wedding.
Prawer and Wachspress said they first heard about the carer’s untimely death via another Philippine national who had been a close friend.
“It took me a long time to believe this had actually happened,” said Wachspress.
“I couldn’t absorb it,” said Prawer, adding, “We were up crying all night. It’s devastating.”
The two said they took comfort in the words Velasquez de Vera had uttered at Gurin’s funeral in 2021. “She said, ‘Until we meet again, and I’ll continue to take care of you in the afterlife,’” Wachspress recalled. “It’s consoling.”
Note: This article was updated with information conveyed by the Philippines Embassy.
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