How Israeli hostage families rallied Trump to their cause

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. Just a few months before President Trump took office, families of Israeli hostages held in Gaza started lobbying him to their cause. In one meeting in New York in 2024, Adi Alexander was surprised to realize Trump thought most of the Israeli hostages being held by Hamas were dead.

It was a dangerous misconception, he felt, one that could prevent the administration from putting pressure on Israel and Hamas to strike a deal. Alexander’s 21-year-old son, Edan Alexander, who was raised in New Jersey, was serving in the Israeli military when he was kidnapped on Oct. 7, 2023.

Adi Alexander told the president that more than 55 hostages were believed to be alive at the time. “He was actually shocked," Alexander said of Trump’s response. The administration didn’t respond to a request for comment on the meeting.

That meeting and others that followed with Trump and his close circle before he took office marked a turning point in how the president would view the issue. It is all part of a major lobbying effort by Israeli and American hostage families to convince the most powerful man in the world to help bring their relatives home. The campaign involved wealthy Jewish donors, a celebrity podcaster, hundreds of volunteers, and countless relatives who have put their lives on hold for full-time advocacy work.

Hostages who were released after a January cease-fire have begun telling their stories of captivity, and many hostage families are taking to the streets to pressure Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to end the war in exchange for the release of the remaining hostages. The fighting, they say, endangers the hostages’ lives. Yet while Trump has become increasingly vocal about the hostages’