Islamic Jihad released a new video on Wednesday of one of the Israelis taken hostage on October 7, 2023. It shows a young bearded man identifying himself as Sasha Trupanov. Speaking in Hebrew, he alluded to the Israeli military offensive in Lebanon launched in the second half of September and to Israeli air raids against Iran in late October, and called on Israelis to step up demonstrations aimed at putting pressure on the government with a view to the release of hostages held captive in the Gaza Strip.
This is the third video released by Islamic Jihad of Sacha Trupanov, a 29-year-old Russian-Israeli, kidnapped with his partner Sapir Cohen, on Kibbutz Nir Oz. Its broadcast comes a few days after Qatar announced that it would cease its mediation between the Israeli authorities and Hamas, with a view to obtaining a ceasefire in Gaza and the release of the hostages.
This “horrible video (…) underlines the urgency of the return of the (…) hostages”, who “have no more time to lose”, after the ordeals they endured and while they “ face an increased risk of losing their lives after more than a year of detention,” declared the Families Forum, the main association of relatives of hostages, in a press release.
