At weekly protest, Yair Golan vows to replace government with ‘loyalists of Zionism, democracy’

Speaking at a hundreds-strong protest on Tel Aviv’s Kaplan-Begin junction, also known as Democracy Square, Yair Golan, leader of the Democrats party, vows 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, praises the audience for showing up week after week to protest against “this horrible government.”

“You are the everyday heroes,” he says.

He accuses 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 replace them, dry up the poison machine, and return this nation to a discourse of sanity,” he says.

Golan punctuates his speech with the statement that “this is a promise, not a threat” — apparently a nod to the minor controversy he effected this week by threatening legal procedures against Police Commissioner Daniel Levy in a hypothetical future government.

Golan has become a favorite target of the right-wing Channel 14, where a panelist falsely claimed this week that the ex-general’s “pacifist” daughter had evaded the draft — despite the fact that Golan has five sons and no daughters.

Introducing Golan, journalist Linoi Bar Gefen, the protest’s MC, quips that he should be congratulated for his daughter who “was born this week and is already a draft dodger.”

After Golan’s speech, iconic Israeli rock band T-Slam performs 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, says the band had been scheduled to perform at the weekly protest against the judicial overhaul that was set to take place on Saturday night, October 7, 2023.