BRING HERSH GOLDBERG-POLIN- AMERICAN/ISRAELI HOSTAGE AND ALL THE HOSTAGES HOME

 BRING HOSTAGE HERSH GOLDBERG-POLIN HOME, BRING ALL THE HOSTAGES HOME!

(For many hours I have done exhaustive online research about hostage Hersh Goldberg-Polin and his parents, especially his mother Rachel Goldberg. I have pieced together below the personal story of Hersh Goldberg-Polin and his parents Rachel Goldberg and Jonathan Polin from various sources. This post are the specific words as spoken by Rachel Goldberg).

I hope that you take the time to read it and understand better what they are all experiencing as human beings and the reasons that it is so important to NOT FORGET ABOUT THE HOSTAGES AND TO BRING THEM HOME.

Rachel Goldberg is the mother of 23 yr. old Hersh Goldberg-Polin who was kidnapped and remains a hostage of hamas.

A grenade blew off part of his arm at the deadly Nova Music festival in Israel.

"When people ask Rachel Goldberg how she is doing following the kidnapping of her 23 yr. old first born and only son, Hersh Goldberg-Polin , she speaks plainly: "Terrible".

Hersh, an American-Israeli born in Berkeley, California, was at the deadly Nova music festival in Israel. where more than 260 attendees were massacred by hamas terrorists.

While taking cover in a bomb shelter, a grenade blew off part of Hersh's arm from the elbow down. When hamas ordered those who could walk to leave the shelter, HERSH was among them, and his phone would soon ping from across the border in gaza, where authorities say he is being held hostage.

His PARENTS, WHO WERE BORN AND RAISED IN Chicago and moved to Israel 15 years ago, haven't heard from him since.

Rachel said " I don't live in the universe you live in anymore. I live in an alternate universe. My husband Jon and I, we have brand new 23/7 jobs: All we do is try to help save Hersh.

I get up in the morning and I go have a cup of tea, and then I go to get dressed and say to Jon, "I'll go do my cry now." And I cry and scream into my T-shirt or whatever it is. And then I'm like , all right, and go to work for the next 20 hours.

Rachel and Jon have also traveled all over the world to bring attention to their hostage son and the other hostages.

They met privately with President Biden, the Pope, UN leaders sand numerous politicians, begging for them to help free their son and all the other hostages

The Wednesday before October 7th was a Jewish holiday, Simchat Torah which is Hebrew for "the joy of Torah." It is a celebration , often accompanied by dancing and singing, to mark the completion of the annual reading of this section of the Bible. Each week of the year, congregations around the world read a particular portion of the Torah, called a parashah, in a specified order.

They went to synagogue. Hersh danced with the Torah. We went to our friends and had this great meal. Around 11 p.m. he kissed me, he hugged our hosts goodbye, and he left to go be with his buddy, Aner, to go camp out somewhere.

And it's Israel-I didn't say "give me your coordinates. They're not babies, They are 23 yrs. old. And that was the last time I saw him.

Saturday morning I was drinking a cup of tea in the kitchen and close to 8 a.m., the sirens went off in Jerusalem. And so I quickly went to wake up my girls who were still asleep to get them into our bomb shelter.

After we didn't hear anything and 10 minutes passed, I went upstairs to get my phone and there were two texts from Hersh.

One said "I love you" and the second said , "I'm sorry."

And I knew instantly that something horrible was about to happen. Most 23 yr. old boys at 8:10 a.m. in the morning aren't writing to their parents, "I love you, and I'm sorry". I mean to me, it was just horrible.

And then we had to figure out, well, where are they? And my daughter started to quickly do some online research, She said, "Oh, there's a nature music festival happening in the south"

A third Friend of theirs wrote back immediately, 'Yes, they are there."

And then we were just desperate trying to figure out, how do we find him? Subsequently we received a picture that showed that he had made it to a bomb shelter. So we were very happy to hear that because it was someone else's picture that they posted on social media.

We could see Hersh on the side, midway in the room, and we saw Aner in the doorway, and there were about 30 people mashed in there. And what we came to find out is that hamas came to the door and started throwing in hand grenades.

Everyone who we spoke to who did walk out alive and was not held captive has told us they would not ne alive if it wasn't for Aner because he kept catching the grenades and throwing them out, very, very fast. He was also trying to fight the terrorists who had submachine guns that they were shooting. He was fighting them with his hands and his feet, He was right in the front of the door.

We heard this from people who pretended that they were dead under the bodies because there were so many people killed. There was a lull and smoke from the grenades, and then hamas walked in and they said "'Whoever can stand up. stand up."

And there were 3 young men who stood up. One of them was Hersh, and all 3 of the eyewitnesses who were hiding and playing dead said that Hersh's arm below the elbow had been blown off, but he had managed to tie on a tourniquet to stop the bleeding. They all said he didn't cry out. He didn't make any sound.

The police and the army and some representatives here here confirmed that Hersh was kidnapped by hamas and a subsequent hamas video confirmed he was alive.

I try to picture my son tying a tourniquet tight enough enough if your missing a whole limb, by yourself, not having access to antibiotics , pain numbing medications.

We soon got confirmation that Aner's body was found.

So on a Friday we went to bury him with his family. Hersh and Aner grew up as little boys together, there are so many cute pictures of them through the years doing fun things.

Their crime was going to a music festival.

When i I'm sitting with these other American families who have loved ones who are being held hostage, it's children, young men and older people. I mean this is not recognizable what is happening now.

I am hopeful and I am praying. I am a mother who would love nothing more than my son to be home, and that's all I can be focused on. Hersh is my only son and he is my first child. He is what made me a mother. I feel like God could have given him to anyone and he have me the perfect son for me.

Who is Hersh? He has a dry, dark, but not mean sense of humor. Hersh is a voracious reader, so he knows lots of trivia, random things. He's been obsessed since first grade with geography. He has been planning a this huge trip around the world since he was a little boy.

This past summer in Europe, he went to six different music festivals by himself, he made friends along the way.

Everywhere he went with his tiny little backpack, because who needs more than two shirts? At some point my husband Jon said to him. "Please tell me you are changing your underwear.

Hersh is a really kind kind person and very, very respectful. I realized in this last week that I have never heard him yell. He is a very even keeled person, and I really, really hope he's a survivor."

If you want to help bring back Hersh and the other hostages there are letters and other actions that you can do, other ways to advocate for the safe return of all the remaining hostages.

https://www.facebook.com/BringHershHome

If you want to help bring back Hersh and the other hostages