Thousands of Israelis gathered in Jerusalem on Monday to pay their final respects to Hersh Goldberg-Polin, who became one of the best-known of the hostages held by Hamas in Gaza.
The body of Goldberg-Polin, a 23-year-old US-Israeli national, was recovered along with five other bodies from a Rafah tunnel on Saturday. An autopsy found that the hostages were killed around 48 hours before the rescue.
“Hersh and I watched a documentary about young people who died,” his mother, Rachel, recalled at Jerusalem’s Har Hamenuchot Cemetery. “He said to me: ‘How is it that everyone dies young, always smart and funny and wonderful?’ Hersh was not perfect, but he was my perfect son. And I want to thank God for giving me the perfect gift that is Hersh. For 23 years I had the great honor of being Hersh’s mother. I just wish it would have lasted a little longer.”
His father, Jon, recalled Hersh’s self-confidence.
“Hersh was always confident in himself. When we told seven-year-old Hersh that we were moving to Israel — that his name would be a challenge to the Israelis, that he might want to change his name — he looked at us confidently and said, ‘I am Hersh. The Israelis will deal with it.’”
At the gravesite, President Isaac Herzog asked for the family’s forgiveness.
“I apologize on behalf of the State of Israel. Sorry that we failed to protect you in the terrible failure of the seven in October. Sorry we failed to get you home safely,” Herzog said. “Sorry that the country you immigrated to at the age of seven, wrapped in the Israeli flag, failed to keep you. Dear Rachel, Jon, Libby and Orly – I apologize. Sorry we weren’t able to bring your Hersh home alive.”
Goldberg-Polin was abducted from the Nova Music Festival. The all-night rave, attended by 3,500 people on the grounds of Kibbutz Re’im, became a killing field where 364 people were massacred and 40 others were taken hostage. Of all the locations attacked by Hamas on October 7, the highest death toll was at the music festival. A memorial at the site of the festival has emerged as a pilgrimage point for Israelis to process their grief and for visiting foreigners to show solidarity.
During the attack, Goldberg-Polin, his best friend Aner Shapira, and others took refuge in a shelter. When Hamas terrorists repeatedly threw grenades into the shelter, Shapira managed to lob seven back out before he was killed. A blast blew off part of Goldberg-Polin’s left arm. Taken captive to Gaza, no signs of life were received until April when he appeared in a hostage video.
Raised in Berkeley, Calif. and Richmond, Va., Goldberg-Polin’s family moved to Israel in 2008 when he was age seven.
President Joe Biden, who met with Goldberg-Polin’s parents, said he was “devastated and outraged” by the news of Hersh’s death. The parents had recently addressed the Democratic National Convention, where they chants of “Bring them home” and extended applause.
“It is as tragic as it is reprehensible,” Biden said on hearing the news of Goldberg-Polin’s death. “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.”
At least 1,200 people were killed, and 252 Israelis and foreigners were taken hostage in Hamas’s attacks on Israeli communities near the Gaza border on October 7. Of the 97 remaining hostages, more than 30 have been declared dead. Hamas has also been holding captive two Israeli civilians since 2014 and 2015, and the bodies of two soldiers killed in 2014.
