Adir Abudi

Maj. Adir Meir Abudi, 23, the commander of the Tavor Company in the Home Front Command, from Modiin, was killed on October 7 battling Hamas terrorists trying to infiltrate the IDF Zikim base.

He was buried on October 10 in Modiin. He is survived by his parents, Anat and Yehezkel, his siblings, Yossi, Liel and Natan, and his girlfriend, Alexa Baluev.

Abudi was one of the most senior commanders on duty at the Zikim training base when it was attacked by Hamas. Abudi took charge and went to fight the invasion and told all the young trainees on base to seek shelter, saving their lives. Six of the commanders, including Abudi, were killed in the battle, and all but one trainee emerged alive, and the base was ultimately not overrun.

“Adir decided to bring all the trainees out of their guard posts and replace them with commanders,” recounted one female commander who took part in the battle, in a conversation with Channel 13 news. Hours later, after a number of soldiers on the front had already been killed, “Adir tried to run in a zig-zag toward the terrorists, and he was shot in the heart.”

Cpt. Or Moses and Cpl. Neria Aharon Nagiri — the only new recruit killed in Zikim — tried to rescue Abudi, and were also shot dead.

His girlfriend, Alexa Baluev — who met Adir during her army service — recounted to the TV network that “I wrote to him to look after himself, not to be a hero — I didn’t want him to be a hero. I’m the most proud of him in the world. But I didn’t want him to be a hero… but that was Adir. He always told me that he was waiting for this moment, to be at the front, to take charge, to protect the country.”

Abudi was a devoted soccer fan, regularly participating in games as well as watching the sport, and his family is arranging a tournament in his honor in his hometown of Modiin.

His brother, Yossi, told Channel 13 that “he was a king. He was my brother and my best friend. Adir, to me, was almost everything.”

His mother, Anat, told a local Modiin news site that her son was the kind of person “who knew what friendship was, who knew how to identify hardship of a friend and lift his spirits… Adir was a person who entered the hearts of people. He wasn’t someone who passed by, but burrowed in and remained within you, a boy with endless generosity.”

She recounted that while their family has no connection to the Holocaust, Adir would give generously to charities that helped Holocaust survivors, and was always deeply concerned when he had IDF trainees who struggled to have enough food.

“He bought food vouchers for them with his own money and told them that it was from the army and not from him, so they wouldn’t feel uncomfortable,” she said.

Anat told Israel Hayom that her son was “a quiet boy, introverted, but when we saw his behavior as a commander we got to know a different Adir, one of those people who leave a mark. As a commander, he was modest with a very high work ethic, who fought until the end and didn’t lose his fighting spirit — until a bullet hit him in the heart.”
Source: The Times of Israel