‘Over my dead body’: Bereaved families rage against PMO’s removal of ‘massacre’ from Oct. 7 commemoration bill

By Ariela Karmel

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11 February 2026, 3:30 pm

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Ariela Karmel is a political correspondent at The Times of Israel. She previously reported for Calcalist and Haaretz. She holds an MA in Middle Eastern and African History from Tel Aviv University and a BA in Political Science from the University of British Columbia.

Bereaved families express outrage after the Prime Minister’s Office requested to remove the word “massacre” from the title of a bill to commemorate the Hamas onslaught of October 7, 2023, and instead call it the”Memory and Commemoration of the events of Simhat Torah” bill. A Knesset committee has approved the change, though the matter isn’t final.

“This law will pass over my dead body,” says Hila Abir, sister of Lotan Abir, who was murdered at the Nova music festival, during a discussion on the bill at the Knesset Education, Culture and Sports Committee. “Where is the death of our brothers and children? It was all erased!”

She rails further against the fact that the committee is busying itself with “changing the narrative” before a commission of inquiry has been set up to establish what exactly happened and how to prevent future disasters.

“It makes no sense for the Prime Minister’s Office to manage this event when it is the one preventing the investigation,” Abir says. “You’re putting the cat in charge of the cream?”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has long opposed the formation of a state commission of inquiry, claiming that because a state commission is appointed by the judiciary – whose powers his government has sought to curb – it would be biased against him.

Instead, the coalition is advancing a bill to set up a politically appointed probe instead of an independent state commission of inquiry, in a move opposed by most hostages’ families and the relatives of those murdered on October 7.

“We waited two and a half years, and we’ll wait a little longer until there is a worthy law that suits everyone, until there is a worthy investigation,” Abir says.

The October Council, representing bereaved families of those murdered during the October 7 attacks, says in a statement that this is “the Prime Minister’s Office’s latest attempt to cover up the October 7 massacre.”

“We are here to state clearly: there was a massacre. We paid the highest possible price for it. We will ensure that everyone responsible is investigated by a state commission of inquiry and also pays the price,” the statement continues.

“No politician’s blood is redder than the blood of our children, our brothers, and our parents. Shame on you,” it says.