Putin meets with Russians freed by Hamas, expresses gratitude for ‘humanitarian act’
On Wednesday, Vladimir Putin met with several Russian citizens who had been freed from captivity by Hamas. The president welcomed to the Kremlin Alexander Trufanov — released by Hamas on February 15, 2025 — along with his mother Elena Trufanova and fiancée Sapir Cohen, who were freed in late 2023. Also present at the meeting were Russia’s chief rabbi, Berel Lazar, and the president of the Federation of Jewish Communities of Russia, Alexander Boroda.During the meeting, Putin thanked Hamas for releasing the hostages. “We must express our gratitude to the leadership and political wing of Hamas for cooperating with us and carrying out this humanitarian act,” he said, adding that Russia would “do everything possible to ensure such acts take place more often.”Twenty-nine-year-old Alexander Trufanov, a dual citizen of Israel and Russia, was abducted from the Nir Oz kibbutz during Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7, 2023. While being abducted, Trufanov was shot in both his legs. He and two other Israeli citizens were released on February 15 as part of a deal between Hamas and Israel.In mid-January, Israel and Hamas reached an agreement on a temporary ceasefire and the release of 33 Israeli hostages in exchange for nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners. Attempts to extend the agreement failed, and Israel resumed military operations in the Gaza Strip on March 18. Hamas is still holding 59 Israeli hostages. According to the Israel Defense Forces, at least 35 of them are confirmed dead. Hamas militants killed more than 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took some 250 people into captivity in Gaza in October 2023. In March 2025, Palestinian health authorities said Israel’s ground and air campaign had killed more than 50,000 people, with nearly a third of the dead under the age of 18. Two months earlier, a peer-reviewed statistical analysis published in The Lancet journal concluded that the official Palestinian tally of direct deaths likely undercounted the number of casualties by around 40 percent in the first nine months of the war.
