During the 10 months since their son Hersh was taken hostage by Hamas, Rachel Goldberg-Polin and Jon Polin have addressed all kinds of unexpected audiences: the United Nations, the president, the pope.
Now, the couple are about to face what could be their largest audience yet: the 20 million Americans who have been tuning in nightly to watch the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
Their message: Bring Hersh home, along with the more than 100 other hostages still held by Hamas in Gaza.
It’s a message that the Chicago natives have been pressing unrelentingly since almost as soon as it became clear that Hersh, 23, had survived Hamas’ attack on the Nova music festival on Oct. 7, but had been seriously injured and abducted.
With the help of their international network of friends and acquaintances, their English-language fluency and their quiet religiosity, they have emerged as some of the most prominent and indefatigable of the hostage families. They have sought to keep attention on their loved ones even as the Israel-Hamas war has galvanized global criticism of Israel, including from within the Democratic Party.
Rachel Goldberg-Polin in particular has become a public face for grieving mothers, posting daily messages on Facebook, flying around the world to meet with anyone who will listen and inspiring a ritual that has taken off among some Jews: to wear a piece of tape marking the number of days since Oct. 7. When she takes the stage on Wednesday, that number will be 320.
“It’s not describable how any of us are doing to people who haven’t been through it,” she told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in December. “Thank God not many people have been through what we, the hostage families, are going through. We get up every morning and we have to pretend to be people. Because in order to save them we have to function.”
The couple’s Chicago roots made them a natural fit for the convention. Jon Polin grew up in West Rogers Park and Skokie, a north side neighborhood and suburb, respectively, with large Jewish communities. Rachel Goldberg-Polin grew up in Streeterville, a different Chicago neighborhood. The couple met at their Modern Orthodox high school, Ida Crown Jewish Academy, and later married and moved to Israel after stints in Berkeley, California, where Hersh was born in 2000, and Richmond, Virginia.
But it was not at all clear that they or any other hostage families would speak, given criticism of Israel and its war in Gaza, which has divided the Democratic Party this year.
Parents of a 22-year-old Israeli-American hostage, Omer Neutra, spoke at the Republican National Convention last month, leading the crowd in chanting, “Bring them home.” But Israel has drawn little direct attention during the Democrats’ convention, which is designed to broadcast unity, and hostage families’ request for a speaking slot drew no confirmation even as the convention got underway.
The couple’s speaking slot was reported, first by the Forward, only hours before the night’s lineup got underway.
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