The al-Quds Brigades, the military wing of Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), has released a video of an Israeli hostage in which he directs a message to the Israeli government.
In the video, titled “message 01”, the hostage identified himself as Alexander Troufanov and said he had been held by the PIJ – the second largest faction in Gaza – for a year. Some media reports have referred to him as Sasha Troufanov.
There was no indication of when was the video filmed. Troufanov appeared in two videos in May, in which he stressed that the only way to get the Israeli hostages released was through reaching a prisoner-hostage swap deal and implementing a ceasefire in Gaza.
He said the past year had been marked by “food, drinks and electricity shortages” and noted that hostages were now facing shampoo and soap shortages, which has caused him “skin problems” that he had not suffered from in the past.
Troufanov called on Israelis to “remember the hostages” as they enjoy eating and drinking. He also called on the Israeli government to “remember the hostages” as it “closes the [Rafah] border crossing to make the lives of Gazans harder”.
He said that his life had been “in danger” over the past year due to the Israeli military operations “which are supposedly carried out to save us [ the hostages]”, saying PIJ fighters had saved his life several times and some were killed and injured during the process.
Troufanov called on Israelis to “escalate” their ongoing protests urging the government agree to a deal to bring the hostages home. He urged protesters to go on strikes and close roads as the government has been “ignoring them” over the past year. He explained that the only way for the hostages to return to their homes and families was through “exercising pressure on the [Israeli] government”.
