Master Sgt. Shai El Knafo, 30: Police officer and father of three

Master Sgt. Shai El Knafo, 30, a patrolman in the Israel Police’s Southern District, from Beersheba, was killed on October 7 battling the Hamas attack on the Supernova music festival.

Shai was working as security for the festival that morning alongside his commander, Insp. Andrey Poshivay. When the attack began, they helped partygoers flee and fought back against the Hamas onslaught until they were both slain in the fight. Video footage from that morning shows Shai acting calmly to assist civilians and help people get to safety, assuring them that they would be OK.

Shai was buried on October 9 in Beersheba. He is survived by his wife, Sapir, their three children, Shilat, 9, Tahel, 6 and Lavi, 4, his parents, Ilana and Mordechai and his siblings Idan and Hila.

Born and raised in Beersheba, Shai was a devout fan of Hapoel Beersheba, attending as many games as he could. He even was a founding member of one of the team’s fan groups, The Camels.

He was also into video games, an online eulogy said, and he worked as a technician fixing phones, computers and video game systems before enlisting in the Israel Police in August 2022.

Shai’s younger sister, Hila, wrote on Instagram about the experience of being a “bereaved sister — it’s a longing that beats inside you, every second of the day. Longing for the crazy brother you were, and maybe also for who you could be today.”

“Being a bereaved sister is to cry until it hurts, and after a few seconds to laugh until your stomach hurts, laughter that comes from the heart, when I remember the brother that you were,” she added. “Thank you for the best 15 years I could wish for myself, I’ll take care of everybody down here, and you make sure to watch over us from above.”

Shai’s mother, Ilana, wrote on social media marking a year since he was killed, “a year from the last time you called me Mom, a year that my heart skips a beat, a year that my soul is shattered, a year of longing every day, every hour, pain that only grows. A year of sleepless nights thinking endlessly about what you went through in your final moments, and how I didn’t succeed in protecting you.”

Ahead of Passover 2024, his wife, Sapir, wrote on social media to “my love, we miss you so much, all of us!”

“With every holiday that approaches, your loss is felt more and more, with every step we take,” she added. “How can it be? How can we sit together around the table, on the most family-oriented holiday there is, the holiday that was the most yours, where we’re meant to be happy, without you?”

And on Hanukkah 2024, Sapir wrote about how many people were memorializing Shai, “and I’m happy that people know you and your bravery,” even though “you were never someone who sought fame or heroism, but a modest guy who did everything quietly, put your family first. But there’s no doubt that you deserve it because you fought, you thought about all the people you could have saved, and you did.”

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