It won’t be long now before it will be his second birthday in captivity. On November 11, Alexander Sasha Trupanov will be 30 years old. He had to spend the 29th in the hands of Hamas in Gaza. His friends from the university where he had completed his studies in electrical engineering a year earlier were on stage with the singer Shai Gabso, singing “Hajom Jom Huledet” and crying.
The young man was kidnapped by terrorists during Hamas’ devastating attack on Israel’s southern communities on October 7, 2023, along with his mother Lena, his grandmother Irena Tati and his girlfriend Sapir Cohen. The three women were released at the end of November through an agreement between Israel and Hamas. The young man is still a hostage.
In May, the terrorist group Palestinian Islamic Jihad released two propaganda videos by Trupanov. In one, he addresses his parents, mother Lena and father Vitaly. He apparently does not know that Vitaly was murdered by the terrorists on October 7.
Sasha and his girlfriend Sapir had recently moved in together in Ramat Gan.
Sasha and his girlfriend Sapir had only recently moved in together in Ramat Gan. They had been visiting Sasha’s family in Kibbutz Nir Oz over the holidays when the horror struck. Sasha’s parents and grandmother were in their house with a safe room, while Sasha and Sapir were sleeping in another house without a safe room.
Trupanov is an engineer at Annapurna Labs, an Israeli microelectronics company that was bought by Amazon. His friends have tried several times to get Amazon to comment on Sasha, but so far without success. To draw attention to the hostage-taking and provoke a reaction from Amazon, they attended an Amazon conference in Las Vegas, rented trucks on which they placed pictures of Sasha, and wore T-shirts with his picture. Below, in bold letters, they read: “I wish I were here.”
