Iraqi FM says Israeli researcher held hostage is alive, efforts ongoing to free her
Russian-Israeli academic Elizabeth Tsurkov is believed to be held by Iran-backed militia Kataeb Hezbollah since 2023 abduction; hostage envoys met with her family this month

Elizabeth Tsurkov, a Russian-Israeli researcher who is believed to have been kidnapped in Iraq by a local terror group nearly two years ago, is alive, and Iraqi Prime Minister Muhammed Shia al-Sudani is working for her release, Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein told journalist Barak Ravid on Thursday.
“Iraqi foreign minister Fuad Hussein told me in Davos that Princeton researcher Elizabeth Tsurkov who has been held hostage by an Iraqi militia is alive and stressed Prime Minister Sudani is working for her release,” Ravid, who writes for the US Axios site and Israel’s Walla, posted on X.
Tsurkov, a 38-year-old student at Princeton University, disappeared in Baghdad in March 2023 while doing research for her doctorate. She had entered the country on her Russian passport. The only sign she was alive was a video broadcast in November 2023 on an Iraqi television station and circulated on pro-Iranian social media purporting to show her.
No group has claimed responsibility for the kidnapping. But Israel believes she is being held by Kataeb Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed Iraqi terror group that it says also has ties to the Iraqi government.
Earlier this month, a senior Israeli official said Israel is working with allies in a renewed push to win Tsurkov’s freedom.
The official’s statement came after special envoys for hostage affairs met the family of Tsurkov, and Israel asked the representatives — from the US, UK, Germany, Austria and Canada — to have their embassies in Baghdad lobby the Iraqi government and search for a way to start negotiations.
The Israeli official said that after months of covert efforts, Israel believes the “changes in the region” have created an opportunity to work publicly for her release.
During 15 months of war — which began when the Hamas terror group invaded southern Israel from Gaza on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages — Israel has struck Iran and its allies, and Iran’s regional influence has diminished. Iraq also appears to have pressured militia groups into halting their aerial attacks against Israel.
Agencies contributed to this report.