‘Get them out of that hell’: Israelis protest across the country, demand hostage deal
Hostage’s father urges Trump to pressure PM to sign agreement: ‘Netanyahu is trying to deceive you’; opposition figures lead rally against ‘toxic’ government
Thousands of people attended pro-hostage deal rallies and anti-government protests across the country Saturday night, the fourth night of Hanukkah, days after Israel and Hamas once again accused each other of derailing negotiations for a deal to release the captives held by Hamas and other Palestinian terror groups in Gaza.
The families of several hostages delivered remarks at a press conference in Tel Aviv before the rallies kicked off.
Yehuda Cohen, the father of hostage Nimrod Cohen, claimed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was trying to “deceive” US President-elect Donald Trump into believing that he was truly interested in reaching a deal with Hamas.
“Dear President Trump, Netanyahu is trying to deceive you. Ending the war and returning all the hostages is in the interest of the State of Israel,” Cohen said. “You might be the last person who is able put pressure on Netanyahu. Do not compromise on a partial deal that will become a death sentence for the remaining hostages and will not bring about an end to the war.”
“The talk from Netanyahu and the defense minister about continuing the war and maintaining military control of Gaza serves the extremists in government and is contrary to Israeli interests,” he added.
Einav Zangauker, the mother of hostage Matan Zangauker, addressed Netanyahu during the press conference, accusing him of “rushing to torpedo” the latest efforts to reach a hostage deal.
“Netanyahu is afraid of [National Security Minister Itamar] Ben Gvir and [Finance Minister Bezalel] Smotrich and is refusing to end the war, in complete contradiction to Israeli interests,” Zangauker said. “Netanyahu and [Defense Minister] Israel Katz are sitting in heated rooms and bragging about continuing the war, while my Matan and the other hostages are freezing and rotting in the tunnels.
“The blood is on your hands,” she added. “End this war and get my Matan, and all the hostages, out of that hell.”
Zangauker led the crowd in a chant: “Netanyahu don’t forget, history won’t forgive.”
Saturday night also saw the Prime Minister’s Office deny a report by Channel 12 that Israel and Hamas could agree to a “limited” hostage deal as a gesture of goodwill ahead of the start of Trump’s second term in office. The report claimed both sides are interested in reaching a smaller deal in time for Trump’s inauguration on January 20.
In a short statement, the PMO called the report “a complete lie.” A senior Arab diplomat also denied the report to The Times of Israel.
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum’s rally in Tel Aviv Saturday night was kicked off by former hostage Yocheved Lifshitz, who was released last November and whose husband Oded remains in captivity. Lifshitz lit the Hanukkah candles at the start of the rally with her son Yizhar.
Israel and Hamas have blamed each other over the past week for procrastinating in the hostage deal talks, which had appeared to gain new momentum in recent weeks.
The Forum has assailed Netanyahu for apparently aiming to reach a deal that would initially release only so-called humanitarian cases — female, elderly or sickly hostages.
“After 14 months, they’re all humanitarian,” the Forum said Thursday in an announcement of its weekend rallies and warning that the hostages may not survive the coming winter.
Speaking to a crowd of hundreds at Hostages Square, Yair Mozes, son of hostage Gadi Mozes, said: “Again there are negotiations, and again we hear the prime minister and defense minister in public statements that only prevent the return of everyone.”
Israeli negotiators were reportedly dismayed by Netanyahu’s statement to The Wall Street Journal last weekend that he wouldn’t sign a deal that ends the war, and Katz’s statement from Gaza’s Philadelphi Corridor on Wednesday that Israel would retain security control of the Strip, seeing them as likely to harden Hamas’s position.
“How much longer can this go on?” asked Mozes. “What more [must happen]? Everyone already knows [the hostages] don’t have any time left.”
A block away from the Hostages Square rally, anti-government activists and some hostages’ families and their supporters protested in front of the Begin Road entrance to IDF Headquarters.
That protest was bolstered by demonstrators from an earlier nearby event against the return of the government’s judicial overhaul.
The anti-overhaul protest, organized by the Free in our Homeland movement, started with a march from Tel Aviv’s Habima Square to the junction, also known by activists as Democracy Square. At the protest, Yair Golan, leader of the Democrats party, vowed to topple the government and replace it with “loyalists of Zionism and democracy.”
Golan, a former general who leads a merger of the left-wing Labor and Meretz parties, praised the audience for showing up week after week to protest against “this horrible government.”
“You are the everyday heroes,” he said.
He accused the government of running “toxic” propaganda that promotes “lies, racism and hatred”; “dismantling the justice system and democratic institutions”; prolonging the war in Gaza as a way to stay in power; and failing to establish a commission of inquiry into events leading up to the Hamas onslaught that sparked the war, “because they know that a state commission of inquiry will find them responsible for what happened on October 7, what happened before and what happened after.”
“We are the power, and with that power we’ll toss them out, dry up the poison machine, and return this nation to a discourse of sanity,” he said.
After Golan’s speech, iconic Israeli rock band T-Slam performed its 1990 protest song “Face of the Nation,” in which a corrupt politician promises material favors to people who vote for him.
Danni Bassan, the lead singer, said the band had been scheduled to perform at the weekly protest against the judicial overhaul set to take place on October 7, 2023.
Protesters also gathered in other cities across Israel, including Haifa, Herzliya, Rehovot, and Jerusalem.
On Saturday morning, police arrested five people who had protested for a hostage deal outside Netanyahu’s home in Jerusalem, according to the Detainee Support Group, a team of lawyers who volunteer on behalf of detained anti-government protesters.
Channel 12 reported that the protesters were detained on their way back from the two-dozen-strong, 20-minute demonstration. According to the report, police followed the group and accused them of violating noise laws. The protesters were interrogated and later released.
