15 arrested at anti-government Tel Aviv rally; right-wing agitators berate protesters, steal shirt

The anti-government, pro-hostage deal rally on Tel Aviv’s Begin Road, which organizers say drew hundreds of thousands, disperses relatively peacefully but not without arrests, after police arrested 15 people according to the Detainee Support Organization, which represents people arrested at anti-government rallies.

Reports say that according to police, some were caught with shredded tires and a substance suspected to be flammable.

Meanwhile, young right-wing agitators clash with some protesters who remain even as traffic resumes on the central traffic artery, though none of the agitators are arrested.

For the second straight time, this week’s rally merges with — or rather, subsumes — the weekly anti-government rally on neighboring Kaplan Street.

Officers chase away a band of youth who come at the end of the rally to taunt and clash with the few remaining protesters, ripping down posters in their wake.

Passing a stand offering free water to protesters, a pair of youths shout: “For leftists it’s with cyanide.”

Some 20 of them steal a shirt from an anti-government vendor’s stand. The youth, pushed off to Kaplan Street, attempt to hold the shirt to a flame until officers once again come to chase them off.

They linger for another 45 minutes on the Kaplan-Begin interchange, where they taunt a group of protesters that headed home remaining in front of the IDF headquarters’ Begin Road entrance.

Police push back a band of far-right youth who came to clash with pro-hostage deal protesters on Tel Aviv's Begin Street, as an officer escorts away an anti-government vendor from from whose stand the youth stole a shirt. pic.twitter.com/bfH1Vd2pC4

— Noam Lehmann (@noamlehmann) September 14, 2024

Earlier, near the interchange, various left-wing groups outside the rally’s mainstream demanded an end to the killing in Gaza.

A woman walked around wearing a sign that assails protesters for ignoring the “criminal killing in the West Bank and Gaza.” On her mouth was another sign reading: “Silence is a crime.”

A 20-strong group called on Israelis to refuse military service as they waved flags of the far-left Antifa movement and hoisted a banner of Hadash, an Arab-Jewish communist party.

Protesters wave Antifa flags and hoist a @hadash banner on the outskirts of Tel Aviv's pro-hostage deal rally.

'Soldier – attention! Refusal is an option!'

The banner reads: 'In Gaza and Sderot, children want to live.' pic.twitter.com/dlsmNyuz7j

— Noam Lehmann (@noamlehmann) September 14, 2024

Nearby, a man lay in a pool of mock blood next to a rubber head of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“Tomatoes cost NIS 22.90 [$6], but blood is free,” read a sign on the installation.