Rachel Goldberg at Ben Gurion Airport in Israel, Dec. 27, 2023. Photo: Shanie Roth
Rachel Goldberg-Polin, whose 23-year-old Israeli-American son is still being held hostage by Hamas terrorists following the Oct. 7 attacks in southern Israel, has been included in this year’s Time magazine annual list of the “100 most influential people” for her global campaigning efforts to secure the release of her son and all the hostages in Gaza.
Hersh Goldberg-Polin was abducted by Hamas terrorists from the Supernova music festival on Oct. 7. A video from his abduction shows Goldberg-Polin being shoved onto a pickup truck at gunpoint after his left arm was blown off from the elbow by a grenade that Hamas terrorists threw into a bomb shelter where he and some friends were hiding. Palestinian terrorists led by Hamas murdered 1,200 people on Oct. 7 in a series of attacks in southern Israel, and more than 250 others were taken as hostages back to the Gaza Strip.
Pleading for her son’s return, Rachel Goldberg-Polin has met with world leaders including US President Joe Biden, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and Pope Francis. She addressed the United Nations in both New York City and Geneva and was on the cover of Time magazine with her husband a week and a half after the Oct. 7 attacks. Goldberg-Polin’s family also launched a social media campaign called “Bring Hersh Home.“
Time described Goldberg-Polin on Wednesday as “one of the most visible advocates for the hostages and their families” when the magazine unveiled her inclusion in its annual list.
“Hope is mandatory,” she said in a recent interview. “I believe it, and I have to believe it, that he will come back to us.”
Commenting on her inclusion on Time‘s list of the “100 most influential people” of the year, she thanked the publication “for recognizing the significance and gravity of the hostage crisis and the need for the world to advocate on their behalf until each one is returned home.”
“I pray this platform will help compel the world not to forsake these remaining 133 souls, who hail from 25 countries, 5 religions and range in age from 15 months to 86 years old, and who have now been held captive in Gaza for 194 days,” she added. “We must not turn a blind eye to the suffering of these human beings, along with the suffering of all innocents in Gaza.”
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