Kfar Sava hero a Ukraine immigrant and 'born fighter'

Jerusalem Post
APril 24, 2003

Alexander Kostiyuk, 24, the security guard killed in Thursday's 
suicide attack in Kfar Sava when he prevented the bomber from 
entering a crowded train station, immigrated on his own from 
Ukraine some six years ago, friends told Israel Radio. 

"He loved the army and was a born fighter," a friend identified 
only as Andrei said. 

Kostiyuk served with the Border Police in the West Bank towns of 
Hebron and Bethlehem and also in the IDF. 

Police commanders praised Kostiyuk as a hero for stopping the 
bomber to ask for his identity papers, apparently because he 
looked suspiciously dressed in a coat on a hot day in central 
Israel. 

The bomber subsequently detonated himself at Kostiyuk's side, 
killing the guard and himself, and wounding a dozen other people, 
but sparing injury to hundreds of others who waited at 
the station. 

While he came to Israel on his own, Kostiyuk's parents later 
joined him, along with a younger brother, Sergei, 13. They live 
in Bat Yam, a coastal suburb south of Tel Aviv. 

Funeral plans have not yet been announced.