WESTBOROUGH – It’s been 100 days of captivity for people who were taken hostage by Hamas.
Locally, community members raised awareness and advocated for their release by participating in a walk from Congregation B’nai Shalom to the Westborough rotary on Jan. 14.
Organizer Nancy Alperson said she hoped people who saw the group walking in Westborough became aware that there were still hostages.
“A lot of people have thought that all of the hostages were released in November, and they’re not aware that there’s still hostages,” she said. “The biggest thing is just letting their representatives know.”
That morning, Bring Them Home Now said that there were 136 hostages, according to Alperson.
Alperson started the Shrewsbury group of Run For Their Lives following the attack on Israel in October. The parents of one of the hostages — Hersh Goldberg-Polin — is from near where she grew up in Illinois and close to her son’s age.
“I started following Bring Them Home Now because I was just very upset by it,” Alperson said.
She learned about Run For Their Lives. As part of the event, the communities gather for a 1 kilometer walk or run once a week.
“I’m also not a runner, I’m a swimmer, but … I can walk or run for 18 minutes a day,” she said.
The number of groups has “totally exploded recently,” she said. The Shrewsbury Run For Their Lives group has met two other times and is made up from people of different religions.
On Jan. 14, the participants carried photos of the hostages during the walk. Liz Hallsworth carried a photo of her relative David Cunio. His wife and kids have been released, but he has not, she said.
“They just need him home,” she said.
Contact information for the Shrewsbury group can be found by visiting https://run4lives.org/.
