Captive Polin Appeals to Biden Before Bombing

The Hamas Qassam Brigades broadcast a recording, Thursday, 5 September, 2024, of an Israeli prisoner with American citizenship, who was killed by the occupation army and whose body and five  other prisoners were recovered last Saturday inside a tunnel in the city of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip.

In the recording, slain prisoner Hersh Goldberg-Polin asked US President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, and all American citizens to do everything they can to “stop the war and this madness and bring him home.”

He pointed out he became 23 years old just four days before his arrest at a concert in the Re’im area in the so-called “Gaza enveloped” on 7 October, 2023.

He highlighted the extent of the suffering he is experiencing in Gaza and said he does not remember the last time he saw the sun or breathed fresh air, but he stressed what is worse is the Israeli [government] attempt to bomb him without stopping “so it wouldn’t not bear responsibility and reach an agreement.”

Born in California

Goldberg-Polin, who was born in California and lives in occupied Jerusalem, said that since his arrival in Gaza, he has been trying to stay alive without any medical assistance, with little food and water.

He sent an emotional message to his family, stressing he knows they are doing everything they can to bring him home, and asked his family to stay strong for him.

Last April, the Qassam Brigades published a video recording of the prisoner Goldberg-Polin, in which he attacked the Netanyahu government and accused it of negligence and failure to work to release him and the rest of the detainees.

On 13 May, the Qassam Brigades announced it had lost contact with a group of resistance fighters guarding four Israeli prisoners in Gaza, including Goldberg-Polin, due to the Israeli bombing of the Strip.

Since last Monday, the Qassam Brigades began broadcasting the last messages of the six Israeli prisoners, starting with the prisoner Idan Yerushalmi, then Ori Danino, before broadcasting – Wednesday – a recording of the prisoners Alexander Lubnov and Carmel Gat.

All the recordings hold the Israeli government led by Benjamin Netanyahu and the security and military services responsible for what happened on 7 October, 2023, and all the captives demanded the speeding up of an exchange deal and for the popular demonstrations demanding their return continue so that they could return home alive.

Last Sunday, Al-Qassam broadcast a message to Israeli society stating that “Netanyahu chose the Philadelphi Corridor at the expense of liberating your prisoners,” noting that these captives were alive but have become a thing of the past, whilst stressing Netanyahu is creating dozens of Ron Arads.

On 23 April, the Brigades’ spokesman Abu Obeida said that the “the Ron Arad scenario may be the most likely to be repeated with the enemy’s prisoners in Gaza,” stressing that “the so-called military pressure will only push us to stand firm in our positions and preserve the rights of our people and not relinquish them,” according to JO24.

CrossFireArabia

CrossFireArabia

Dr. Marwan Asmar holds a PhD from Leeds University and is a freelance writer specializing on the Middle East. He has worked as a journalist since the early 1990s in Jordan and the Gulf countries, and been widely published, including at Albawaba, Gulf News, Al Ghad, World Press Review and others.

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Israel Continues to Target Children – UN Report

Israel continues to commit genocide and other atrocity crimes by deliberately targeting Palestinian children, a UN report said on Tuesday.

“Israeli authorities and security forces have deliberately targeted Palestinian children resulting in genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes in the Gaza Strip and war crimes in the West Bank,” read the report published by the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel.

The commission said it had concluded last year that Israel committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, and found that the intense scale and systematic nature of the Israeli military operations have continued, causing unprecedented death, injury and trauma among Palestinian children.

“The deliberate targeting of children is one of the key elements establishing genocidal intent of the Israeli authorities and security forces to destroy the Palestinian group, in whole or in part, in Gaza,” the commission said.

“The evidence shows that Palestinian children have been deliberately targeted and killed by the Israeli security forces,” said Srinivasan Muralidhar, chair of the commission.

“Even after the October 2025 ceasefire, children continue to be killed and seriously injured, with continued disregard by Israel for the ceasefire and for the protection owed to Palestinian children under international law,” he added.

“Palestinian children have been arrested and subjected to torture and other severe forms of mistreatment in Israeli prisons and detention facilities, with no information on their whereabouts,” the commission said.

“Israeli security forces have also used sexual violence against children as part of the collective shaming and oppression, entrenched within a prolonged, ethnic, gendered, and intergenerational pattern of Israeli occupation and hostilities,” it added.

The report said Israel’s targeting of neonatal and maternity care centers in Gaza directly harmed the survival of newborns and Palestinians’ reproductive future, including increases in miscarriages, birth defects and lasting vulnerabilities among newborns.

“Starvation imposed by Israel through blockade and siege have further caused the death of Palestinian children and severely impacted the health of many others, depriving them of essential nutrition and increasing disease risks amid reduced immunization, food insecurity and destroyed health services,” it also said.

“Even if the bombs and guns fall silent in Gaza and West Bank, Palestinian children will not simply recover overnight,” Muralidhar said. “The destruction of their health, education and development is irreversible.”

“The protection, care and survival of Palestinian children are inseparable from the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination,” Muralidhar said. “By targeting children, Israel is attacking the very capacity of the Palestinian people to exist and to determine their future.”

The commission said it had identified Israeli military units responsible for killing and injuring Palestinian children and made recommendations to Israel and UN member states to ensure accountability.

According to Gaza’s Health Ministry, Israeli attacks have killed 1,021 Palestinians and injured 3,249 others since late 2025 in daily violations of the ceasefire in effect.

Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza since October 2023 has killed 73,032 people, injured over 173,300 and caused massive destruction to about 90% of the enclave’s infrastructure, with the United Nations estimating reconstruction costs at about $70 billion.

Since October 2023, West Bank cities and towns have seen near-daily Israeli raids, including arrests and home searches. The escalation by the Israeli army and occupiers has killed 1,173 Palestinians, wounded 12,666, led to the arrest of about 23,000 and displaced 33,000, according to official Palestinian figures. Anadolu

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