Cory Booker Saw 'Frightened Faces' During Hamas Attack

Sen. Cory Booker was jogging in Jerusalem on Saturday when he received a call from his staff saying that Israel was under attack. Get back to the hotel, he was told. When he got there, Booker hid with other "frightened faces" in a stairwell. "There were children, elderly, families, many Americans," Booker said. "There was a sense of fear and worry, and a knowledge to many of us that there were horrific things going on around the country at the time." The New Jersey Democrat returned Sunday to the US, as did Rep. Dan Goldman, who was in Tel Aviv for a family bar mitzvah, NPR reports.

Booker, who arrived in Israel on Friday for meetings, described the moment in a video on X, which USA Today posted here. Goldman said on Today that he, his wife, and their children were awakened by sirens and retreated to stairwells several times Saturday. "Our experience was traumatic," the New York Democrat said, "but of course it is nothing compared to so many Israelis down in the south, just massacred with barbarism that we have not seen." Booker also condemned the Hamas attack, saying he was more committed now to working in the Senate for Israel's security and stability in the region. (More Israel-Hamas war stories.)