Mass demonstrations were held on Saturday, September 14th, in dozens of centers across Israel. Many gathered at the central rally at Shaar Begin in front of the Kirya in Tel Aviv, which, like last week, was united with the demonstration against the right-wing government at Kaplan Junction. At the rally, Einav Tsengauker, whose son Matan was kidnapped in Gaza, spoke and said, “The Israeli government is using my child as a hostage for its continued survival. Just like Sinwar’s life, the Israeli government depends on the abductees remaining in captivity. My Matan was kidnapped by the prime minister who is not willing to release him because of the motives of the government!”
“Members of the coalition, listen to me, we are done playing games and cheap spins, every one of you who cooperates with Netanyahu’s strategy of murdering the abductees, will pay for it. Not only in the pages of history will you be judged for neglecting citizens, you will have nowhere to run!”, she emphasized.
At the huge rally of the families of the abductees, a video message from educator Adina Bar Shalom, daughter of Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, was also shown. Bar Shalom said, “It is a mitzvah to save a person even on Yom Kippur, they desecrate Yom Kippur. Let’s go to our Jewish values, let’s connect with them. We will join them by force because they are our own!” She even quoted Jewish sayings: ‘anyone who saves a life is as if he saved an entire world.‘ “Can we put these values aside? What are we Jews doing? You will not stand for your neighbors?”, she emphasized. On the sidelines of the rally, on Kaplan Street, a protest was held by activists against the occupation and the war with the participation of Hadash, Maki and Banki members who chanted, among other things, “Enough with the war, enough with the war!” and during which the words of the resister Itamar Greenberg, who was imprisoned for his refusal to participate in the war in the Gaza Strip.
At the end of the rally, many demonstrators blocked the Ayalon lanes. Tsengauker, who built Matan Hatuf in Gaza, sat there on the road when others shouted at her: “You are not alone!” Later, hundreds of demonstrators marched on Namir Road – where flares were lit. Fifteen protesters were arrested that night at a demonstration in Tel Aviv, and another veteran protester, Michal Deutsch, was arrested in Paris Square in Jerusalem. She was transferred to Neve Tirtz for the night, after, according to the police, she “violated the conditions of her release from previous arrest upon her arrival at the demonstration.”
As mentioned, demonstrations were held Saturday in a series of centers across the country, and in Jerusalem, thousands gathered in Paris Square where Deutsch was arrested. Thousands also demonstrated at Horev Junction in Haifa, and the demonstration there was preceded by a march that left the auditorium in the center of Carmel. The former head of the Shin Bet [the Israeli secret service], Ami Ayalon, said at the demonstration: “Civil protest is the decree of the hour, it is our right and it is our duty.” Ayalon called on the Israelis to take to the streets: “The majority of Israeli citizens, who see like us the dead-end road the government is leading us to have decided to surrender! Some are tired and don’t have the strength to take part in the fight! Some have given up and see no point in protesting in the street. And some adopt the ancient Jewish narrative – to ignore and wait for the storm to pass. Memorizing to themselves what their parents taught them in exile – ‘We got through Pharaoh, the diasporas, the disturbances, the Holocaust‘ – we will get through this too.” Ayalon addressed those people who are not protesting: “In the Israeli reality – none of us have the moral right to stay at home. If we don’t do anything if we surrender, we will give up – the abductees who were abandoned did not get out of their hands. Our young men who are sent to battle – will not return home.”
Near the residence of the Netanyahu family in Caesarea, the demonstrators against the right-wing government delayed the departure of the prime minister’s armored vehicle convoy, which eventually slipped through them at high speed under heavy security and escorted by vehicles while the demonstrators chanted boos.
Demonstrations were also held in Kermi Gat, Shaar Ha’Negev Junction, Netanya, Ra’anana Junction, Karkur Junction, Herzliya, and the Anchor Junction in Emek Hefer. A demonstration was also held in the Tzahala neighborhood in northern Tel Aviv with a display of abductees in front of President Yitzhak Herzog’s private home. The protesters demanded that the president “stop normalizing the lawlessness against the abductees that is being carried out by Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and the Israeli government.”
About a thousand people gathered in the streets at the Science Park intersection. Gil Dikman, a cousin of Carmel Gat who was murdered in a tunnel in Rafah, said at the demonstration: “From the moment Carmel was murdered, a whole machine of poison sent a frenzied stream of hateful reactions, they did not wait for the swearing to end for a kidnapped woman who was murdered in captivity. They accuse us of her murder. Carmel and the five abductees with her survived in this torture cellar for a period of time that seemed like eternity. They were strong together and survived together. What killed them was not the lack of air and light, nor the diseases in the terror camps – but the Prime Minister of Israel who said ‘no’ to the deal that would bring her back, and the military pressure, for which the guard pulled the trigger. Now the IDF also understands – military pressure kills abductees.”
At a protest in Herzliya, Idit Alexandrovich, who was arrested along with two activists on Friday after handing out leaflets in the synagogue, said that “probably what we are saying scares the minister who runs the police, and this government. This is what I once explained to my nine-year-old about bullies. The thing that scares them the most is that they will reveal who they are and what they are doing.” Activists of the Mizrachi-Civil collective also demonstrated last night at the Dimona junction calling for the end of the war and the redemption of prisoners.
