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On Wednesday evening, the parents of Hersh Goldberg-Polin came to the Democratic convention, and for eight minutes and forty-four seconds, the politics stopped.
“This is a political convention, but needing our only son and all of the cherished hostages home is not a political issue,” Jon Polin, Hersh’s father, declared, eliciting sustained applause.
Both Polin and his wife, Rachel Goldberg-Polin, had attached a strip of masking tape to their shirts with the number 320 on it—indicating that the hostages have been in captivity for 320 days.
“We’re heartened that both Democratic and Republican leaders demonstrate their bipartisan support for our hostages being released,” Jon Polin said.
Rachel Goldberg-Polin talked about the “109 treasured human beings” being held hostage, adding, “They are Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, and Buddhists. They are from twenty-three different countries.”
Delegates wept and nodded along and murmured, “Oh, my God,” and “That poor, poor boy,” as images of Hersh, 23, appeared on the jumbo screen behind his parents—smiling and suntanned. In between bursts of applause, they chanted, “Bring them home! Bring them home!” Almost all of the tens of thousands of people crammed into the United Center stood silent.
There were no boos, no one waving any Palestinian flags. No one talked about “cease-fires.” If the left has been consumed by a mystifying moral relativism over the past few decades, there was none of that on Wednesday. There was just a tearful couple onstage doing what parents everywhere, anywhere, would do.
It was the most powerful moment, so far, of the week—and it echoed similar speeches given at last month’s Republican convention, in Milwaukee. It was also a reminder that the great bulk of Democrats are sympathetic to the plight of the Jews murdered and raped and taken hostage by Hamas on October 7, 2023—the antisemitism that seems to have engulfed much of the left notwithstanding.
As they were about to exit the stage, Rachel Goldberg-Polin leaned into the microphone and said: “Hersh, if you can hear us, we love you. Stay strong. Survive.”
Peter Savodnik is a senior editor for The Free Press. Read his piece “A Vanishing Biden Reappears at the DNC” and follow him on X @petersavodnik.
This is so dishonest. If Democrats were truly not beholden to radical antisemitic forces in their base, if they truly supported the release of the hostages, then 1) Harris wouldn’t be meeting with the Mayor of Dearborn and his ilk. 2) John Fetterman would be at the convention. 3) Josh Shapiro would be the VP nominee not Walz. 4) they wouldn’t have had to (ironically) build a WALL and check IDs and use POLICE force to protect their silly little convention. (Weird how all that stuff is suddenly not racist anymore specifically for the precious DNC.)
5) anti-Israel hacks like AOC and Omar and Bernie would not have such high standing in the party. 6) Democrats would have an actual fucking plan for getting the hostages out beyond trying to appease a genocidal terrorist organization and they don’t. 7) Biden wouldn’t have been both-sides-ing this issue literally two days ago…
There have been protests outside the convention everyday that have included unlawful encampments, attempts to break into the DNC, setting fire to American flags, and harassing Jews.
What this family is going through is real, genuine pain. Their son has been held captive for almost a year by the worst people on earth because the Biden/Harris administration is feckless and weak. And the Democrats are using their tragedy—that their administration caused—to peddle a lie that their presidential nominee is not somehow the most radically anti-Israel candidate in modern American history. But sure, Peter, these people want to bring the hostages home…
These people are massive hypocrites. The hostages -- even the Americans -- have been invisible in the media since they were taken. During the Iran hostage crisis, photos of the hostages were prominent in the media over the the 400+ days of their captivity. We knew their names, and we knew their faces. Our government attempted to carry out a rescue mission which ended badly. Anyone who might have attempted to tear their photos down from a public space would have been shamed.
The media has all but obliterated the fact that American hostages are still held in captivity, and that our government has done nothing to try to free them except jibber-jabbering in an obsequious fashion with their captors. I saw one editorial in the Wall Street Journal about this silence; apart from that everyone seems to be fine with it. Now that it comes up at the convention see them weep ostentatiously. They are disgusting.