Bring Them Home Now
What follows is my sermon from the Shabbat evening service following the funerals of the six murdered Israeli hostages.
To say that this week has offered particularly painful days is a terrible understatement. It has been wrenching. The news that six hostages—namely Hersh, Carmel, Eden, Alex, Almog and Ori—were murdered only days before Israeli soldiers reached them was beyond comprehension.
Although all lives hold equal value Hersh Goldberg-Polin’s death crushed me more than those of the others. He was one of the few hostages from Jerusalem. His picture was plastered everywhere I turned in the Jerusalem neighborhood I call home for two weeks every summer. His parents Jon and Rachel, and most especially Rachel, showed such remarkable courage and poise during these past eleven months and helped me become acquainted with Hersh’s character, his passions and interests as well as his endearing quirks and loving nature.
When I heard Rachel first speak in Washington DC at the November rally, I doubted her belief that Hersh was still alive. His arm had been blown off when he and his best friend Aner tried to escape the onslaught in a fortified bus shelter. Aner was killed by grenades. Hersh lost his arm. How could he survive without emergency medical care, I wondered. But he did. She was right when she stood only days ago at Gaza’s border shouting his name and pleading with him to stay strong. And he did—for eleven months.
I watched his funeral online along with thousands of others. There were audible wails among the thousands of people in attendance. The cries became distorted on my laptop’s speakers. I marveled at his family’s strength. I admired how Hersh’s friends held each other up as they spoke. How could one not weep as Rachel spoke about her dear, sweet boy? She said,
I am honest. And I say, it is not that Hersh was perfect. But, he was the perfect son for me. And I am so grateful to God, and I want to do hakarat hatov and thank God right now, for giving me this magnificent present of my Hersh…. For 23 years I was privileged to have this most stunning treasure, to be Hersh’s Mama. I’ll take it and say thank you. I just wish it had been for longer.
There are not enough tissues for the grief this year has offered our people. Every day seems to offer enough heartbreak for a lifetime.
Hamas murderous rampage continues to terrorize us. Israel’s heavy-handed response has made us defensive in even the most genteel of settings. Let me be honest. Netanyahu is ill fitted for leadership at this dangerous and pivotal moment. The radicals he has empowered endanger lives and undermine our people’s moral fiber with their desire to resettle Gaza and their efforts to organize Jewish prayer near Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque. Let me be clear. Benjamin Netanyahu is not responsible for Hamas’ genocidal ideology or their actions, but he is responsible for Israel’s response to it and Israel’s lack of readiness on October 7th. He is no longer the right leader for Israel and the Jewish people. And Israelis are taking to the streets once again protesting his failures and most especially his abandonment of the hostages. I wish to stand with those Israelis protesting against Netanyahu and his government’s unprecedented failures and standing up for a better, and perhaps brighter, future for the country we so love.
Israel cannot destroy Hamas completely. It can degrade its capabilities. It can work with allies to cut off its funding. But it cannot wipe it out. Even if the IDF were to destroy all of Gaza and kill thousands more Gazans—God forbid—it would not eradicate Hamas. Thousands of additional dead will not make us any safer. A military cannot destroy an ideology. It can better protect its citizens and kill as many terrorists as possible, but it cannot destroy an ideology as much as justice might demand such an outcome. At this juncture Israel’s best alternative is a cease fire. Had that been agreed to a few weeks ago, Hersh would have been home, in the embrace of his mother and father, and sisters, and friends. He was among the first on the list of those who would have been released.
This week’s Torah portion speaks about justice. It states, Tzedek, tzedek tirdof—justice, justice you shall pursue. (Deuteronomy 16) Justice is a pursuit. The Hebrew is even stronger. It suggests that we must run after justice. It implies that justice is an effort. But the tradition has another saying. We read in Pirke Avot, “Be a rodef shalom—a pursuer of peace.”
How can one pursue both justice and peace? They are often in conflict. Justice demands that Israel continues its fight until it captures (actually recaptures) or kills the mastermind of October 7th’s brutality, Yahya Sinwar y”s. But that would mean condemning the remaining hostages to Hersh’s terrible fate. Life demands compromises. Preserving life most especially necessitates compromises. Saving life requires us to let go of the notions of perfect justice and even I must admit, 100% security.
Could the future price of such compromises be too great? I do not know. The tradition debates ransoming captives at length. Can a community sell a Torah scroll to fulfill the mitzvah of pidyon shevuyim?, it asks. Yes, it answers. Could paying too high a price encourage more hostage taking? The Talmud says, yes. The tradition appears as befuddled as we currently are. I know this for certain. All I can be crystal clear about right now and in this moment is those 101 families. Their pain is too much to continue to carry.
This evening Hersh’s father Jon offers the closing words. At his son’s funeral he said,
Hersh, Forgive us. Sorry we failed you. We all failed you. You would not have failed you. You would have pushed harder for justice. You would have worked to understand the other, to bridge differences. You would have challenged more people to challenge their own thinking. And what you will be pushing for now is to ensure that your death and the deaths of all the soldiers and so many innocent civilians are not in vain. Your starting point would be returning all of the hostages. For 330 days mama and I sought the proverbial stone that we could turn over to save you. Maybe just maybe your death is the stone, the fuel that will bring home the remaining 101 hostages.
May it be God’s will.