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Floor Speech

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Mrs. GILLIBRAND. Mr. President, it has been more than a week since Hamas terrorists attacked Israel, killing more than 1,400 people and wounding thousands more. But every day, still more horrifying stories and images emerge, depicting unspeakable atrocities.

Just the other day, there was an interview with an Israeli father on CNN. The father said his 8-year-old daughter went missing during the attack. After 2 agonizing days, the father learned his little girl was dead. But it was his reaction that really hit me. When he heard the horrific news, the father said that he felt relieved because ``if you know anything about what they do to people in Gaza, that is worse than death.''

Can you imagine what it must be like to fear your loved ones--your sons, your daughters--could be suffering; that they could be enduring a fate that is worse than death? As a mother, I cannot even imagine what it must be like to lose a child, let alone in this way, to see loved ones slaughtered, mutilated, and burned. But to see them taken hostage or paraded through the streets, to worry that at any moment they could be enduring unspeakable horrors, it is a pain that is unconceivable and seems impossible to bear.

On Long Island, we have a family whose son was taken hostage. His name is Omer Neutra. He is just 22 years old--not much older than my eldest. Omer was an honors student in high school, and he loves the New York Knicks. He deferred his acceptance to Binghamton University to spend a gap year in Israel and join the IDF.

On the day of the attack, he was defending the Gaza border. But he was last seen being forcibly removed by the terrorists and has not been heard from since.

Omer is just 1 of nearly 200 people who were abducted by Hamas: toddlers, babies, teenagers, moms, grandmothers, grandfathers, people who cannot go without their medicine or are even too young to walk. Entire families were captured and used as human shields.

One 85-year-old grandmother, Yaffa Adar, was carried off in a golf cart as she held her head high. But her family says without her medication, it is likely going to be a lot of pain for her. A mother was on the phone with her son when he was abducted, and she heard him say to the terrorists: ``Don't take me. I'm too young.'' Another mother, Shiri Silberman-Bibas, can be seen in her captor's video clutching her two young children, sheer terror in her eyes. And 23-year-old Hersh Goldberg-Polin had his arm blown off from the elbow down before he disappeared near Gaza. A young woman was thrust brutally into the back of a truck, her hands cable-tied behind her back, blood streaming down her arms, legs, and her back. A Holocaust survivor in a wheelchair-- imagine surviving the Holocaust only to be taken hostage by terrorists. This is the kind of anti-Semitic violence Jewish people have faced for millennia.

Until last week, many of these people were ordinary, peaceful people just going about their daily lives: working, going to school, dancing at a music festival. Now we don't know what has become of them, and many of their families fear the worst.

As the days wear on and the situation in Gaza becomes more desperate, the danger to those hostages only grows. Already, Hamas terrorists have threatened to execute hostages. As a U.S. Senator, my top priority is the safety of the American people, and I am going to be working closely with the State Department to secure the return of 13 Americans who are still unaccounted for, like Omer and Hersh.

But as we continue in this mission, I want the hostages and their families to know, we will not stop fighting for you. We will do whatever it takes to bring you home, and we will never give in to terrorists.

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