At weekly rallies, hostage families urge one-phase deal to bring everyone home
With Mossad chief about to fly to Qatar to restart talks with Hamas, hostages’ loved ones lament apparent lack of authority to make concessions, say ‘it’s time to finish the job’
Families and thousands of activists on behalf of the 101 hostages held in Gaza for over a year rallied around the country Saturday night in favor of a single-phase deal to free the abductees, amid efforts to restart mediated talks with the Hamas terror group.
“A deal is the only way to save lives, even if the cost is high,” said Moran Stela Yanai, who was abducted by Hamas terrorists during the group’s October 7, 2023 attack, and then released as part of a weeklong truce the following month.
“I survived 54 days in Hamas captivity. I’m here before you, not because of a daring rescue or a secret mission, but by virtue of a deal,” Yanai told a crowd of some 500 protesters in Tel Aviv.
“There, in hell, I saw death with my own eyes. Every moment I felt fear and helplessness. Every moment was like an eternity, every night was a world unto itself,” she said, adding that she can’t help but think of what it’s like for those still in captivity.
“If a deal had been made in time, many [more] hostages could be here with us,” Yanai continued. “Many of them didn’t return, because we chose to wait, and waiting brings more and more victims.”
Mossad Director David Barnea was set to travel on Sunday to Qatar, which is mediating the talks and hosts a number of top Hamas leaders, to restart discussions on a hostage deal after they were largely stalled for over two months.
However, an official in Israel’s negotiation team has told families of hostages that Barnea is yet to receive a sufficiently broad mandate from the government to achieve results in the talks, Channel 12 news reported on Saturday.
The weekly rally, organized by the Hostage and Missing Families Forum and held at the so-called Hostages Square, had taken a monthlong hiatus due to Home Front Command restrictions amid the escalation in fighting against the Hezbollah terror group in Lebanon, but resumed last week.
The protest came about a month into Israel’s ground offensive in southern Lebanon, and ten days after Israeli troops killed Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, the architect of the October 7 attack, in southern Gaza’s Rafah.
It also came the night after Israel carried out widespread airstrikes on military sites across Iran, in response to an October 1 ballistic missile attack — underscoring how focus has shifted from Gaza to other fronts in the war.
At a pre-protest press conference on Saturday, Yifat Calderon, whose cousin Ofer Calderon is held hostage, responded to the airstrikes.
“After the attack in Iran, we are anxious about regional escalation, which will take us further away from a deal and impose a death sentence on our loved ones in captivity,” she said.
The emphasis at the protests was firmly on Gaza, as hostages’ loved ones insisted that the captives not be a second-order priority for the government as it manages the war.
Speakers demanded Israel reach a deal that would see a single-phase release of the 101 remaining captives, saying that any other route would see a group of hostages left behind indefinitely.
The demand for a single-phase release, also mentioned in the Forum’s press release announcing the rally, had been absent from the group’s statements in earlier rounds of negotiations.
Israel’s May 27 proposal, which formed the basis for subsequent talks, envisioned a multi-phase release, with female, elderly and injured hostages released first.
There has also been talk of a “small deal” to free some five captives in exchange for a two-week ceasefire, which Israel, according to officials, is pursuing alongside talks on a larger exchange.
At the pre-protest press conference, Einav Zangauker, mother of hostage Matan Zangauker, claimed that Netanyahu “is using the ‘small deal’ in order to drag his feet and avoid reaching a major deal to return them all.”
Dani Miran, father of hostage Omri Miran, said at the Hostages Square rally that the hostages must be released at once, since “we don’t want any more Ron Arads” — referring to an Israeli Air Force soldier missing since 1986 and believed to have been held by Hezbollah.
“Sinwar has gone up to the sky,” said Miran. “It’s time to finish the job and reach agreements.”
He said government ministers have shown themselves to be “impotent, lacking the capacity to think, lacking the capacity to discuss bringing back the hostages but with great capacity for their own political survival.”
Nira Sharabi, wife of slain hostage Yossi Sharabi and sister-in-law of hostage Eli Sharabi, said at the Hostages Square protest that every day in which Israel fails to “choose a deal to bring back all the hostages” is “another day the State of Israel chooses not to sanctify life.”
“Let us wake up to a different reality,” she said. “I refuse to accept this reality. I will continue to refuse, and the nation of Israel refuses with me.”
Also speaking at Hostages Square was Kumar Shrestha, Nepal’s acting ambassador to Israel, who addressed the crowd after a short video about Bipin Joshi, a farming student from Nepal who was abducted from Kibbutz Alumim on October 7 and turned 24 on Saturday.
Shrestha expressed the Nepalese embassy’s gratitude to the Israeli government for its “continued efforts in finding Bipin,” and to the Families Forum for “consistently advocating for all hostages in Gaza.”
Bipin Joshi, a Nepali citizen, turned 24 today. It was the second birthday he marked while in Hamas captivity.
His family sent a video message, that was screened tonight at Hostages Square, wishing Bipin a happy birthday and hoping to see him back home soon, with all the other… pic.twitter.com/PlHbLPohbC
— Bring Them Home Now (@bringhomenow) October 26, 2024
As the event wrapped up, Lior Ashkenazi, the rally’s MC, struck a combative tone atypical for the Hostages Square rallies.
“Whoever turns their back on the hostages is a traitor!” he yelled. “Anyone who refuses to act now for their return is a fifth column!”
The crowd dispersed after a chorus of “Hatikva,” the national anthem. Some people remained, chanting: “Everyone — now! In a deal — now!”
Meanwhile, at a separate, anti-government protest on Tel Aviv’s Begin Road, near the Israel Defense Forces headquarters, Danny Elgarat, whose brother Itzik Elgarat is held captive in Gaza, addressed Netanyahu, demanding to know why a hostage deal is stalling.
“Who will you blame now” that Sinwar is dead, he asked. “The hostages?”
Elgarat demanded that the prime minister go to Doha himself for the talks.
“Don’t send the Mossad chief without any authority,” he said. “Stop playing for time.”
Bolstering the Begin Road protest — which drew some hundreds of participants — were the Movement for Quality Government and anti-government reservist group Brothers in Arms.
Both groups are prominent critics of the government’s proposed judicial overhaul, which brought record numbers of anti-government protesters to the streets in 2023.
Also present were contingents from leftist groups Standing Together and Breaking the Silence.
The fiery Begin Road protest and the more nonpartisan Hostages Square protest were held alongside each other, but did not appear to formally join, as they had begun to do some eleven months into the war, after the execution of six hostages in late August drew fresh outrage.
Both Saturday protests were held under Home Front Command instructions that, while more relaxed than they have been in recent weeks, still place some restrictions on the size of public gatherings in some areas of the country, including Tel Aviv.
Meanwhile, in Jerusalem, protesters marched from Zion Square to nearby Paris Square, calling for a deal. In Caesarea, anti-government protesters demonstrated near one of Netanyahu’s private residences.
Protests were also held in Kfar Saba, Ness Ziona, Rehovot, Zichron Yaakov, Eilat and at other locales, including various highway junctions, across the country.
At Karkur Junction, in northern Israel, police forcibly removed demonstrators who were blocking the road.
It is believed that 97 of the 251 hostages abducted by Hamas on October 7 remain in Gaza, including the bodies of at least 34 confirmed dead by the IDF.
Hamas released 105 civilians during a weeklong truce in late November, and four hostages were released before that. Eight hostages have been rescued by troops alive, and the bodies of 37 hostages have also been recovered, including three mistakenly killed by the military as they tried to escape their captors.
Hamas is also holding two Israeli civilians who entered the Strip in 2014 and 2015, as well as the bodies of two IDF soldiers who were killed in 2014.
