Anguished parents of Hamas hostage bring painful reality to Democratic convention | Opinion
Political conventions are all about image. But sometimes, when you least expect it, reality intrudes.
That happened Wednesday night at the Democratic National Convention.
And the couple who brought it was Rachel Goldberg and Jon Polin, whose son Hersh was taken hostage by Hamas in the Oct. 7, 2023 attacks on Israel.
The conventioneers responded with tears and chants of “Bring Them Home.”
At the time he was abducted, Hersh was attending a music festival to celebrate his 23rd birthday with his friend Aner Shapiro, a 22-year-old soldier in the Israel Defense Forces. Of the approximately 1,200 killed in the Hamas attack, 367 were at the festival.
“As rockets began to fall, Hersh, Aner and 27 other young festival goers took refuge in a 5-by-8-foot bomb shelter,” Goldberg recounted in a tearful address at the convention podium. “Terrorists began to throw grenades into the bunker. Aner stood in the doorway and repelled seven of those grenades before the eighth one killed him. Hersh’s left forearm, his dominant arm, was blown off before he was loaded into a pickup truck and stolen from his life, and me and John, into Gaza. And that was 320 days ago.”
Polin thanked President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris for meeting regularly with the hostages’ families. He also thanked Republicans who have worked with the administration, seeking to negotiate a deal that would end the Gaza war, bring the hostages home, and relieve suffering for the Palestinian civilians in the crossfire between Israel and Hamas.
Biden and Harris have taken fire from both sides in the Middle East conflict.
Donald Trump, Harris’ opponent for president, criticized Biden at the presidential debate for not expanding the bloodshed, urging him to back away and “let Israel finish the job.”
“He’s become like a Palestinian, but they don’t like him because he’s a very bad Palestinian. He’s a weak one,” Trump said.
Meanwhile, in the streets around the Democratic convention in Chicago, pro-Palestinian demonstrators are at this moment waving signs and flags and chanting that the president and vice president are facilitating genocide.
There’s plenty of pain and anguish on both sides. Those taking extreme positions are not helping.
Anyone who does ought to be forced to watch Goldberg’s and Polin’s convention remarks.
Goldberg ended her speech with a message for her hostage son: “Hersh, if you can hear us, we love you. Stay strong. Survive.”
It was a political convention speech, but there was nothing political about it.
It was the cry of an anguished mother, an ordinary woman whose precious child has been stolen from her.
It was real.
This story was originally published August 21, 2024 at 11:08 PM with the headline "Anguished parents of Hamas hostage bring painful reality to Democratic convention | Opinion."
