The Israeli American hostage who was taken captive by Hamas militants on Oct. 7 ― and whose parents tearfully begged leaders for a cease-fire at this month’s Democratic National Convention ― is confirmed to be among the six captives found dead on Saturday in Gaza, joining the ever-growing toll from almost a year of violence in the region.
Israeli forces said they recovered the bodies of six hostages in a tunnel under the southern Gaza city of Rafah: 25-year-old Ori Danino, 24-year-old Eden Yerushalmi, 27-year-old Almog Sarusi, 33-year-old Alexander Lobanov, 40-year-old Carmel Gat and 23-year-old Hersh Goldberg-Polin. The victims were allegedly found about half a mile from where soldiers rescued 52-year-old Qaid Farhan Alkadi alive last week.
Israeli military spokesman Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani claimed that Hamas killed all six captives shortly before soldiers arrived to rescue them, while Hamas officials maintained that the victims were killed by Israel’s own airstrikes. Citing Israeli officials, Axios reported that it is still unclear exactly when and how the captives were killed.
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Goldberg-Polin, the youngest of the six victims, was a California native attending the Nova music festival in southern Israel on Oct. 7 when Hamas militants attacked, killing hundreds of concertgoers and taking him and four others captive. Militants captured the sixth person, Gat, from the nearby Israeli farming community of Be’eri.
Part of Goldberg-Polin’s left arm was reportedly blown off by a grenade during the attack, and in April a Hamas-issued video showed him alive with an amputated left hand. The video led to Israelis angrily renewing protests against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government for not doing enough to secure the hostages’ release and a cease-fire.
Netanyahu said on Sunday that Israel will hold Hamas accountable for killing the hostages “in cold blood,” and that “whoever murders hostages doesn’t want a [cease-fire] deal.” Hamas official Izzat al-Risheq said that the hostages would still be alive if Netanyahu and his government had accepted the proposed U.S.-supported cease-fire deal the militant group agreed to in July.
President Joe Biden spoke with Goldberg-Polin’s parents on Sunday morning to give his condolences, according to a White House official. The president said in a separate Saturday statement that Hersh’s father Jon Polin and mother Rachel Goldberg have been “courageous, wise and steadfast, even as they have endured the unimaginable.”
“I have worked tirelessly to bring their beloved Hersh safely to them and am heartbroken by the news of his death. It is as tragic as it is reprehensible,” said Biden, whose administration continues to send billions in unconditional military aid to Israel. “Make no mistake, Hamas leaders will pay for these crimes. And we will keep working around the clock for a deal to secure the release of the remaining hostages.”
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Goldberg-Polin’s parents have been pleading at the international level for the release of all captives, meeting with Biden and Pope Francis, as well as addressing the United Nations. The parents spoke to a crowd of the DNC attendees on Aug. 21, urging the world to not reduce the victims as just numbers.
“This is a political convention. But needing our only son ― and all of the cherished hostages ― home is not a political issue,” Polin said on the stage. “It is a humanitarian issue.”
Even though the DNC blocked Palestinians from being able to speak on that same stage, Goldberg-Polin’s parents used their speaking time to also advocate for the Palestinians who have faced nonstop violence in Israel’s war. In the same time period that the six hostages were found dead, Israeli forces killed 47 Palestinians.
Hundreds of thousands of protesters filled the streets in Tel Aviv on Sunday, demanding the prime minister resign for putting his own interests above the return of hostages. Israel’s national labor union, Histadrut, said Netanyahu’s government “abandoned” the hostages” and that the “entire country will stand still” on Monday for a general strike.
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In her statement about Goldberg-Polin’s death, Vice President Kamala Harris did not mention a potential cease-fire deal that the hostage’s parents and other families have been begging for. Instead, the Democratic presidential candidate said that Hamas is “an evil terrorist organization” that “must be eliminated.”
Harris’ “embrace of militarism” is a stark contrast with the “courageous stance of many Israeli hostage families who are protesting Netanyahu’s horrific policy of war above all else,” Layla Elabed, co-founder of the American pro-Palestinian Uncommitted Movement, said Sunday in a statement. “Their anger reveals the dangerous consequences of our own failed foreign policy.”
“We must not forget the 109 hostages still held in Gaza, each a universe unto themselves, and the over 16,000 Palestinian children killed in a genocide fueled by American weapons ― part of the largest Palestinian civilian death toll since Israel’s founding in 1948,” she continued, adding: “Every life is precious, and it’s time to dismantle the hierarchy of human value in our government and party that places Israeli lives above Palestinian lives.”