Sept. 2 (UPI) — Thousands of mourners on Monday gathered in Israel to say their goodbyes to Israeli-American Hersh Goldberg-Polin, who had been held hostage by the terror organization Hamas and whose body was discovered in Gaza last week along with five others.
Israeli flags were waved in the streets as Goldberg-Polin’s family arrived at Jerusalem’s largest cemetery, Har Hamenuchot. Also flying were flags of the Hapoel Tel Aviv Football Club of which Goldberg-Polin reportedly had been a fan.
Israel’s President Isaac Herzog gave a eulogy to the hundreds gathered at the invitation of family, a spokesperson for the family of Jon and Rachel Goldberg-Polin confirmed.
Fighting back tears during the afternoon funeral, Rachel Goldberg-Polin said her late son was finally free and that his family would have to learn to live without him.
“For 23 years, I was privileged to have the most stunning honor to be Hersh’s mama,” she said, her voice shaking at times. “I’ll take it and say thank you. I just wish that it would have been for longer.”
The bodies of six Hamas-held hostages, including that of 23-year-old Goldberg-Polin, were recovered Sunday by the Israel Defense Forces. There were found in a tunnel under the Gaza city of Rafah.
The four men and two women had been murdered about a day or two before IDF troops found them.
Goldberg-Polin’s mother was often one of the public faces of the effort to return home the Israeli hostages taken by Hamas, having gone so far as to meet with Pope Francis and address the United Nations.
“Amidst the inexplicable terror, anguish, desperation and fear,” she said Monday during the funeral ceremony, “we became absolutely certain that you were coming home to us alive. But it was not to be.”
“Now I no longer have to worry about you. I know you are no longer in danger,” she added.
Giving an emotional speech wearing sunglasses and a piece of tape to remember the number of days his son was a Hamas hostage, Jon Polin said “we have all failed” him.
“Hersh, I’m sorry. We’re sorry. We failed; you didn’t fail,” Jon Polin said Monday in Jerusalem.
“The life we had with you was a blessing, and now we will work so that your legacy will be a blessing. I love you.”
Polin said that his son sought ways to make the world better.
Goldberg-Polin’s parents had been pushing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel to seek a deal securing the hostages’ return.
The funeral Monday came on the second day of strikes in opposition to the Israeli government’s failure to safely return the hostages.
“You would have pushed harder, and we will push so that your death and that of all the soldiers will not be in vain,” his father stated on Monday. “We will bring home the remaining hostages. Our hope is not lost yet.”
Herzog, speaking in English after giving remarks in Hebrew, praised Goldberg-Polin’s family.
“As the human being, as the father and as the president of the state of Israel, I want to say how sorry I am that we didn’t protect Hersh on that dark day, how sorry I am that we failed to bring him home,” the Israeli president said.
Herzog said that in life and in death Hersh Goldberg-Polin had “touched all of humanity deeply.”
“Beloved Hersh, with a torn and broken heart,” Herzog continued as he asked for forgiveness on behalf of the Israeli government. “I ask for forgiveness on behalf of the State of Israel. Sorry that we failed to protect you in the terrible failure of the October oath. Sorry that we failed to bring you home safely.”
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