Staff Sgt. Adi Tzur, 20: Quietly assertive ‘hero’ soldier
Killed on October 7 battling Hamas near Kibbutz Kissufim
Staff Sgt. Adi Tzur, 20, a Golani soldier from Jerusalem, was killed on October 7 battling Hamas terrorists at Kibbutz Kissufim.
His loved ones said that he and other soldiers headed to Kissufim when they learned of a terrorist invasion early that morning and engaged in a gun battle with multiple cells of terrorists while under heavy gunfire. This allowed other IDF troops to prepare for attack and join the fight to save the kibbutz. Ultimately, Tzur was fatally wounded during the battle.
He was buried on October 11 on Mount Herzl in Jerusalem. He is survived by his parents, Sigal and Meir, his older brothers Roy and Amit and his girlfriend Inbal Haliva.
His mother, Sigal, shared on Facebook the eulogy she read at his graveside: “Today, as always in your life, I accompanied you, but this time on your final journey. My heart shrinks again and again, the pain does not lessen and the breaths are labored.”
“It was important to me that you left on your final journey from your beloved home, from the streets where you walked all your life to nursery school, to grade school, to soccer, to friends,” she said. She recalled that he was a beautiful baby, “easy to raise, calm… a later bloomer who blossomed slowly… In recent years you reached your peak, my little boy become a young man, full of inner strength and mental power, accepting, enveloping us.”
“Since your childhood, you always knew what you wanted, and what you didn’t,” she recalled. “I was amazed by the quiet assertiveness inside you. You always knew what you wanted, where you wanted to be, and what wasn’t right for you… You had so much modesty, respect for others, compassion and generosity,” she added. “You were always a child of action more than a child of words.”
Adi was a major fan of Real Madrid, and goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois sent a video to his family praising him as “a real hero” and sending them his support.
On what would have been his 21st birthday, Sigal and his brother Amit appeared on Channel 13 news to speak about his memory.
Marking his birthday without him “is a joy mixed with deep sadness that can’t even be explained,” said Amit. “I had no doubt that he would jump ahead in such a situation [on October 7], but even so, for him to charge ahead when he was so outnumbered, when others were wounded, under heavy fire, without really knowing what was going on.”
Amit said they heard so many stories after his death from friends they didn’t even know, “who told us ‘he was like an older brother to me,’ it was incredible. This kid never stopped surprising us, from the day he started walking until his last day.”
“He had a big soul, with a lot of compassion in his heart toward people, animals, he volunteered with animal charities, he adopted a dog who had been abused,” Sigal told the TV network, noting that after his death they found many photos on his phone of him treating and helping stray dogs. “We feel a sense of enormous loss.”
At his funeral, his girlfriend Inbal recalled their parting moments before that Saturday, when she woke up early, “and I gave you a hug and a kiss and I said, ‘Bye.’ And you whispered to me, ‘Don’t go.’ I thought maybe you were dreaming, or you suddenly had an outburst of love, so I gave you another few kisses and I left… Only now I finally understand why you said it, but it’s too late.”
