Abi Korin, a 56-year-old Argentinian-Israeli father of three, was killed while battling Hamas terrorists in Kibbutz Holit on October 7.
Korin, the head of the kibbutz’s local security team, was posthumously recognized as a fallen soldier by the Defense Ministry with the rank of sergeant major in the reserves.
He is survived by his three children, Ido, Ella and Yahel, his parents, Sarah and Moshe, and his siblings, Victoria, Daniel and Ariel.
Family and friends say Korin, who moved to Israel in 1987, fought valiantly to protect his kibbutz from the Hamas invasion, and paid with his life.
“You were ready to sacrifice everything just to protect the residents of Holit,” wrote his friend Dorit Lisavoder on Facebook. “You protected them… with your life.” Lisavoder said that Korin would always call to check in on her, “and you always had the right words to calm me down.”
His former brother-in-law, Noam Moisa, wrote on Facebook that “with every peep in the area you would always jump ahead in your pick-up truck with your radio, always ready, always prepared, always broadcasting calm. You came to Israel out of Zionism, you studied dairy farming and agriculture, but you ended up as the brave local security chief who ran directly into the horrors without thinking twice — and we’ll never know how many friends you saved with your bravery.”
“You gave us the best gift in the world, three wonderful, children, the most perfect in the world, with my heroic sister, and for that, I will be thankful forever,” Moisa added. “You should know that the CD you gave me of Warren G is still at my house, still being played.”
His ex-girlfriend, Noa Bar, memorialized him to Kan as “one of those rare people who was only good. He was full of acceptance and compassion and love. He was a dedicated father and a true friend. He was silly and funny and one of his outstanding talents was photography — he was a great photographer with a unique eye, he mostly liked to photograph the incredible views of the [Gaza] envelope area.”
Korin’s family is well-known in Buenos Aires’s Jewish community. His father Moshe was a local leader and educator who directed the Ramat Shalom primary school and served as culture secretary for the AMIA Jewish Center. His mother Sara was the director of Scholem Aleijem Jewish School, an institution founded in 1934 that now has over 1,300 students.
“Dear Abi, we always will remember the kindness, the good person that you are,” his nephew said at a memorial service at a Buenos Aires synagogue two weeks after his death. “We always asked you how you were, always you replied, ‘Everything is ok,’ always replying with a heart on WhatsApp. You are our hero.”
Alvin Grinfeld eulogized his “close friend” as a man of many talents.
“An Argentinian with great joy for life, a devoted father, a talented photographer, cook, lover of people, a protector, a carer, full of love,” he wrote on Facebook. “The world benefitted from you for 56 years. I already miss you.”
JTA contributed to this report.
