RALEIGH — On Jan.16, the Hostage and Missing Families Forum and N.C. House Republicans held a press conference calling for the immediate release of Jewish and American hostages still held captive by Hamas following the terror attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
The Hostage and Missing Families Forum, a 501(c)3 nonprofit registered in the U.S., was formed less than 24 hours after the attack with the singular goal of bringing the hostages home.
“Today is not about geopolitics or anything like that,” House Speaker Tim Moore (R-Kings Mountain) said at the start of the press conference. “This is about really getting the word out about these families and about these hostages who need to be released.”
Moore also said Anti-BDS (Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions) legislation was being worked on and acknowledged efforts by Rep. Steve Ross (R-Alamance) and by Rep. Erin Paré (R-Wake), who was also involved in a resolution in support of Israel last fall.
In addition to the families and lawmakers present, Consul General of Israel to the Southeastern United States Anat Sultan-Dadon also made some remarks.
Sultan-Dadon thanked everyone in the room for their support for Israel and in calling for release of the hostages.
“It has been 102 days since babies, children, toddlers, women, men and the elderly were brutally dragged into captivity in Gaza,” Sultan-Dadon said. “We still have over 130 hostages remaining in captivity today, and the call to bring them home now should be heard everywhere, not just in Israel, but by anyone and everyone around the world who values life and freedom.”
Family members Moshe Levi and Yair Moses shared their stories of their loved ones still being held by Hamas. Levi’s brother-in-law Omri Miran and Moses’ father Gadi Moses are both still hostages.
Levi described the horror and chaos that occurred on Oct. 7, including Hamas terrorists pointing an RPG at a two-and-a-half-year-old girl and the execution of an 18-year-old girl.
“They attacked humanity on Oct. 7 and they’re committed to attack humanity over and over again unless they’ll be stopped,” Levi said of Hamas. “But what concerns us is that our loved ones, our family members, our neighbors, our friends, our country people will return to our families alive. And for that reason, we here sharing our stories.”
“On Oct.7, his world and all our world, like, almost collapsed because they [Hamas] brutally entered the kibbutz after a brutal attack of missiles,” Moses said after describing his father’s agricultural work at the kibbutz and how his father “loves to help people.”
Moses went on to describe the attack and the murder of friends and neighbors whose bodies were found in the fields nearby.
Near the end of December 2023, the terror group Palestinian Islamic Jihad published a video depicting two Israeli hostages. One of them was Moses’ 79-year-old father and the other was 47-year-old Elad Katzir. Both were kidnapped by Hamas terrorists from Kibbutz Nir Oz on Oct. 7.
Moses’ wife was murdered by Hamas terrorists that day. Katzir’s father was also murdered by the terrorists and his mother was kidnapped but later released in November.
“We don’t know when it was taken,” Moses said of the terrorist-released video while holding a picture up of his father. “He looks very thin. He looks like 10 years older than what he looked in this picture that was taken this summer.”
The Hostage and Missing Families Forum press conference follows Sen. Ted Budd’s (R-NC) trip to the region. He joined a congressional delegation led by Senator Joni Ernst (R-IA) on a trip to the Middle East that included a stop to the same kibbutz Moses’ father was kidnapped from.
“While in Israel, I was particularly moved by our visit to Kibbutz Nir Oz where Hamas terrorists massacred innocent Israeli civilians and took dozens hostage, including Americans,” Budd said in a statement upon his return to the United States. “To see the results of that barbarism firsthand only reinforces my resolve to do everything I can to secure the unconditional and immediate release of all of the hostages. That is exactly the message we sent to the Qatari Prime Minister: His government must do more.”
In the days that followed the press conference at the legislature, Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper issued a post on X that he met with “Palestinian and Muslim North Carolinians” who had lost a family member in Gaza.
“I urge all parties involved to do what it takes to get badly needed humanitarian aid delivered safely to the people who need it,” Cooper wrote in part. “As a person of faith, I pray for an end to the loss of innocent lives and the ongoing violence. In the midst of darkness, there must be hope for a meaningful and lasting peace in the Middle East so that all families can feel safe and secure.”
Cooper also wrote he has heard from citizens about “fears of anti-Muslim/Arab hatred and antisemitism here at home.”
“Racism, bigotry and religious hate will not be tolerated in North Carolina, and I have ordered our Department of Public Safety to work with local law enforcement to protect houses of worship in our state. We must stand together to ensure all North Carolinians feel safe,” Cooper wrote.
In a shorter follow up post, Cooper wrote about meeting some of the same Jewish families that spoke at the legislature on Jan. 16 and posted pictures of himself with those individuals.
“Yesterday I met families of Israeli hostages & a teenager who was a hostage. Their stories are harrowing,” wrote Cooper in the second X post. “They agonize not only for the release of their families kidnapped 103 days ago, but at the devastating feeling they’ve been forgotten. I haven’t forgotten. Bring them home.”
Neither of the statements posted to X by Cooper have yet to appear on the governor’s official website, nor does his Oct. 8 post on X condemning the initial Hamas terror attacks the day before.
Last year, Democrats in both chambers of the North Carolina General Assembly faced backlash for failing to support a resolution and statement supporting Israel after the unprovoked and brutal Oct. 7 terror attacks.
