Mother of Hamas Hostage Folds Origami Cranes to Pray for Son’s Return; Hopes Others Will Help Her Reach 1,000 Cranes

By Keita Ikeda and Talia Rose / Yomiuri Shimbun Staff Writers

1:00 JST, August 30, 2024

WASHINGTON — The mother of an American man taken hostage in Gaza by the Hamas militant group agreed to be interviewed remotely by The Yomiuri Shimbun on Tuesday.

Rachel Goldberg, 54, said she recently started folding origami cranes as a way to help her son return home, after she learned about the Japanese tradition of folding cranes to make wishes come true.

“Every single day is excruciatingly painful,” said Goldberg of the ordeal.

Her son, Hersh, is 23 years old and holds dual citizenship in the United States and Israel. He and a friend went to an outdoor music festival in southern Israel, where Hersh was abducted by Hamas. More than 100 people are still being held hostage.

“This is the number of days since my only son was stolen from me,” Goldberg said, showing a piece of tape she puts on her chest every morning.

Every time being asked how long it had been since he was taken “was like turning a knife in my heart,” she said. So she started wearing the tape to make the number clear to everyone.

Goldberg learned about the Japanese tradition of folding paper cranes to make wishes come true in a book she read a few weeks ago. She decided she would fold origami cranes for Hersh and started making them with her team, aiming to fold 1,000 of them.

She said she hoped that people who learned about her son could help, even by folding one crane. “I bet we’ll have more than 1,000 paper cranes, and maybe that will help Hersh in the way that … making 1,000 paper cranes, in the Japanese tradition, helps people to hopefully recover and have good news.”

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