NEW YORK — The family members of Americans killed or captured by Hamas stood alongside a bipartisan group of lawmakers Friday in Manhattan to demand that any cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas war include the return of their loved ones.
Their fight to keep the attention on the hostages in Gaza has stretched on for six months since the Oct. 7 attack on Israel, but it takes on new urgency as President Joe Biden pressures Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, including in a call Thursday, on the humanitarian toll of the conflict.
The families in New York City were joined by Hudson Valley GOP Rep. Mike Lawler and Democratic Rep. Dan Goldman of Manhattan — a rare show of bipartisanship amid high tension in Washington and splits, particularly within the Democratic Party, over how best to proceed with the war.
“All of this could end very quickly if Hamas would surrender and release the hostages,” Lawler said at the news conference hosted by the American Jewish Committee. “And from my perspective, that is the fastest way for this to end and the cleanest way for this to end.”
The parents of hostages of Hamas gave grim remarks, some holding photos of children they’ve gone nearly six months without an update on. Several mourned the deaths of more than 30,000 Palestinian as the war wears on, all arguing that negotiations to pause military operations should spare lives — American, Israeli and Palestinian.
“How could there not be?” Gillian Kaye, stepmother of hostage Sagui Dekel-Chen, said of the shift in sentiment over the war. “The devastation in Gaza is so tremendous. The starvation, the destruction, the illness, the death.”
But, additionally, she said, “134 innocent people are still hostages. They are still there. They have nothing to do with that. They are still being held captive in these brutal conditions.”
Biden and Netanyahu spoke Thursday in the wake of an Israel Defense Forces airstrike days earlier killing seven World Central Kitchen humanitarian aid workers.
The president, according to a White House readout, “made clear the need for Israel to announce and implement a series of specific, concrete, and measurable steps to address civilian harm, humanitarian suffering, and the safety of aid workers.”
But Orna Neutra, mother of hostage Omer Neutra, said Friday, “Releasing the hostages is a humanitarian issue, the relief will ensure humanitarian aid can reach the citizens of Gaza and should bring overall deescalation to the region.”
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