Protestors in Israel demanding their government make a deal to secure the release of hostages held by militants in Gaza escalated their campaign yesterday, staging a strike that snarled traffic and shuttered businesses.
The action organized by the Hostages and Missing Families Forum marked a fresh push, weeks after militant groups released videos of hostages and Israel signaled plans for a new Gaza offensive.
Protesters fear further fighting could endanger the 50 hostages believed to remain in Gaza, only about 20 of whom are thought to be alive.
Photo: EPA
They chanted: “We don’t win a war over the bodies of hostages” and demanded a deal.
“Today, we stop everything to save and bring back the hostages and soldiers. Today, we stop everything to remember the supreme value of the sanctity of life,” said Anat Angrest, mother of hostage Matan Angrest. “Today, we stop everything to join hands — right, left, center and everything in between.”
Although Israel’s largest labor union, Histadrut, ultimately did not join yesterday’s action, strikes of this magnitude are relatively rare in Israel. Many businesses and municipalities decided independently to strike.
Still, an end to the conflict does not appear near. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has demanded the immediate release of the hostages, but is balancing competing pressures, haunted by the potential for mutiny within his coalition. Far-right members of his Cabinet insist they would not support any deal that allows Hamas to retain power. The last time Israel agreed to a ceasefire that released hostages, they threatened to topple Netanyahu’s government.
Israeli Minister of Finance Bezalel Smotrich yesterday called the stoppage “a bad and harmful campaign that plays into Hamas’ hands, buries the hostages in the tunnels and attempts to get Israel to surrender to its enemies and jeopardize its security and future.”
While demonstrators in Israel demanded a ceasefire, Israel began preparing for an invasion of Gaza City and other populated parts of the besieged strip, aimed at destroying Hamas.
COGAT, the Israeli military body that coordinates its humanitarian aid to Gaza, yesterday said that the supply of tents to the territory would resume. COGAT said it would allow the UN to resume importing tents and shelter equipment into Gaza ahead of plans to forcibly evacuate people from combat zones “for their protection.”
Tents and the majority of assistance have been blocked from entering Gaza since Israel imposed a total blockade in March after a ceasefire collapsed. Deliveries have since partially resumed, although aid organizations say the flow is far below what is needed. Some have accused Israel of “weaponizing aid” through blockades and rules they say turn humanitarian assistance into a tool of its political and military goals.
Israel’s air and ground war has already killed tens of thousands of people in Gaza and displaced most of the population. The UN is warning that levels of starvation and malnutrition in Gaza are at their highest since the war began.
Another 11 malnutrition-related deaths occurred in Gaza on Saturday, the territory’s Health Ministry said, with one child among them. That brings malnutrition-related deaths during the war to 251.
A 20-year old Palestinian woman described as being in a “state of severe physical deterioration” died on Friday after being transferred from Gaza to Italy for treatment, the hospital said on Saturday.
The UN human rights office said at least 1,760 people were killed while seeking aid between May 27 and Wednesday last week. At least 766 were killed along routes of supply convoys and 994 in the vicinity of “non-UN militarized sites,” a reference to the Israeli-backed and US-supported Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which since May has been the primary distributor of aid in Gaza.
The US Department of State on Saturday said all visitor visas for people from Gaza are being stopped while a review is carried out of how “a small number of temporary medical-humanitarian visas” were issued in recent days.
The Hamas-led attack in 2023 killed about 1,200 people in Israel. Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed 61,897 people in Gaza, according to the territory’s health ministry, about half of whom were women and children. The UN and independent experts consider it the most reliable source on casualties.
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