by John Kass

November 2^nd, 2023

Have you ever lost your child in a department store? We have. I remember Betty screaming at the security guards and the Oakbrook store locked down immediately.

A few minutes later, we found the boys—then 4 years old—hiding in the coat racks.

The feeling of helplessness was overwhelming.  What happened to my family years ago probably is trivial when compared to the anguish and pain rippling in waves out from the Middle East.

But that’s what I thought of—the helplessness my wife and I felt so long ago—as WGN radio executive producer Jeff Carlin and I were speaking to John Rauschenberger and his son Joe on our Chicago Way podcast. We were talking about John’s daughter Emilee Rauschenberger.

Emilee Rauschenberger isn’t a lost child. She’s a grown, married woman and mother of five. But she’s trapped in Gaza with no way out from the Rafah crossing to Egypt. There is no power. No water. No food for her five kids. And the bombs keep falling.

I know Israel is in a war for its very survival after Palestinian and Iran-backed Hamas terrorists murdered 1,500 innocent Israeli civilians in the horrendous surprise attack of October 7.

The stories we’ve published at johnkassnews.com reflect that. And how important it is that Israel remain strong. But we’re thinking of other innocent lives too.

Emilee Rauschenberger and her five children are innocent. She married a Palestinian and the family went over to visit when they became trapped.

Her father, John Rauschenberger—brother of Illinois Republican Steve Rauschenberger—and his son Joe have a request:

If you can help them to get out of Gaza to please contact him at JohnRauschenberger@gmail.com

He’s tried contacting the U.S. State Department, but no real luck.

It is what happens in war. Now there is no water. They can’t get out. And the bombs keep falling.

I remember what Betty and I felt like when the boys ran off to hide in the coat racks at Oakbrook. This is much, much, worse. The anguish of families during war.

I can’t put my arms around what the Rauschenberger family has been going through. So much pain.

And pain pain for the families of Israeli and American hostages of Iran-backed Hamas; pain for the innocent Israelis slaughtered by Hamas terrorists, the beheaded babies, the raped Jewish women; the kidnapped elderly; pain for the innocent Palestinians who will be hurt; and pain of American Jews hunted down on American college campuses by radical leftists who hate America, the haters protected by elite universities and corrupt corporate leftist media.

And pain of all the families of the brave Israeli soldiers who will fight in dark tunnels against terrorists who are dug in as American leftist Democrats scream for the deaths of Israelis.

On Wednesday, John Rauschenberger was able to text his daughter as she waited, hoping to use the Rafah crossing to leave Gaza. He wanted to share what she told him with you:

“Dad–We went to Rafah border today. But we were not let through bc the list of people were mainly international NGO staff and neighbouring Arab nationals and injured people. We hope tomorrow, which we heard may let through Americans, British and other nationals. Emile

“Word is next 2 days Americans,”

She put a prayer emoji to punctuate her text to her father.

I thought of him reading it. And all the people on all sides of this.

So much endless pain and misery. So much endless hate.

Kyrie Eliason.

Lord have mercy.

-30-