842: 51 Days
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In Israel last week, L.A. Elbog wanted to do something about his daughter, Larry, who'd been captured by Hamas a year ago when she was 18 and is still hostage somewhere in Gaza. And so he took a bullhorn and went to stand outside an event that was being held by the Prime Minister's political party, where he could, basically he wanted the people running the country to make some kind of deal with Hamas and bring his daughter home. And so, okay, he's standing there with his bullhorn, this grieving, worried parent. It doesn't know if he's ever going to see his child again. And someone throws an egg at him and another egg. Somebody yells and calls him a cancer on Israel. Somebody else accuses him of being funded by Yakyasimwah, the head of Hamas. This is not unusual in Israel. The country is bitterly divided between people like these hostage families who are saying stop the fighting, make a deal with Hamas, bring home the hostages. Even on the other side, the Prime Minister's supporters and his coalition, people running the government, who want to press on with the war and get to a more complete victory over Hamas. I have an Israeli friend who said to me that this war is different from ones in the past in Israel because in the past, he said, once the war started, everybody united. This time, it's driven people further apart to the point where even these anguish families, who you think would have universal sympathy in a country at war or the target of all kinds of hate. Some other examples, a real estate muggle, who's also a big, good-cued supporter, writes tweets that call for the death of the mother of one of the hostages, where here's a video that was posted online of an Israeli right-winger on a motorcycle who pulls over next to a group of hostage families and tells them, "You're going to be murdered. I'm going to murder you. Mark my words." So, in Israel, sporting the hostages for so many people has come to mean that you oppose the Israeli government and the way that they're conducting the war and you want to cease fire and to deal with Hamas. I think here in the United States, we have a different picture of the hostages than what they stand for. Here, I think there's this feeling that if you support the hostages, you support the war and the current Israeli government and the way it's conducted that war with all the bombings and death, the hostages are a symbol, but a symbol that means different things to different people in the U.S. and Israel. It's been a year since the hostages were taken, the current conflict with Hamas began last October 7 with the killing of 1,200 people and the kidnapping of 251 others. So much has happened since then, of course. Israel killed over 40,000 Palestinians, 90% of the population, almost 2 million Palestinians have been displaced from their homes. This past week Israel expanded the war to Lebanon with a ground invasion, Iran sent missiles and response, and the White House has been scrambling to try to stop a full-out regional war. At this point, this war is about so many other things than the hostages. But those 251 people, 117 of them released or rescued, 70 dead, and 64 who are presumed alive and in captivity are still this symbol. There are posters that people put up and other people tear down, they're bringing them home bracelets. But they're also, you know, people, each having their own personal and specific experience
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