A young American Israeli attending a rave that was disrupted by Hamas terrorists on Saturday texted his parents “I love you” and “I’m sorry” before becoming unreachable — as horrifying videos of attackers paragliding into the party and kidnapping attendees emerged.
Hersh Golberg-Polin, who just turned 23 this week, was celebrating in the desert in northern Negev when Hamas militants invaded the party and began attacking attendees, his father told the Jerusalem Post.
You are reading: American man, 23, sends chilling message before going missing from Israeli rave
After texting his parents “I love you” and “I’m sorry,” Golberg-Polin became unreachable.
“We just want him home and safe,” his father, Jonathon Polin, told the outlet, adding that if he could tell his son anything, he would say: “We love you. Come home to us.”
The 23-year-old had also been celebrating his release from his army service, which he finished at the end of April.
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During his service, Golberg-Polin drove tanks in the 7th Armored Brigade and later trained to become a medic, his father said, adding that his son thought it was “more interesting than driving a tank.”
Since the end of his service, he has enjoyed traveling, music festivals, and watching the Hapoel Jerusalem soccer team.
He had been working as both a medic and a waiter to try to save up to visit India, which had been a longtime dream of his, his father said.
Golberg-Polin, a Berkeley, California, native, made aliyah — immigrated to Israel — with his mother, father and two younger sisters when he was just 7 years old.
Hundreds of people were forced to flee the all-night outdoor music festival Saturday as Palestinian militants fired rockets and guns.
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Horrifying videos shared online captured the moment young Israelis went from enjoying the festival to being under attack, with some screaming for their lives while getting kidnapped.
Israel suffered over 600 deaths and nearly 1,600 wounded in a surprise attack by Hamas that was the worst onslaught the country has faced in 50 years.
The attack on Israel was timed to a major celebratory Jewish holiday, Sichat Torah, and came on the 50th anniversary of the 1973 war in which Arab states bombed the country on the Jewish holy day of Yom Kippur.
A Hamas spokesman claimed that the number of Israeli hostages taken is “many times greater than what Netanyahu thinks.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced “We are at war” and vowed Hamas would pay “a price it has never known.”