From the Liveblog of
Tuesday, April 21, 2026
Protesters disrupt ministers’ Memorial Day speeches in Druze village and Tel Aviv
Add ToI as a Preferred Source on GoogleSam Sokol is a former political correspondent at The Times of Israel. He was previously a reporter for the Jerusalem Post, Jewish Telegraphic Agency and Haaretz. He is the author of "Putin’s Hybrid War and the Jews"
Protesters disrupt Memorial Day ceremonies in the northern Druze village of Isfiya and in Tel Aviv, interrupting speeches by Energy Minister Eli Cohen and Immigration Minister Ofir Sofer.
In Isfiya, several local residents yell at Cohen about the government’s housing policy, screaming that “it is the Israeli government destroying our sons’ homes, not missiles from Iran.” These sentiments are also shared, in a less confrontational manner, during a speech by Druze spiritual leader Sheikh Muwaffaq Tarif, according to the Walla news site.
Male Druze citizens are required to serve in the IDF, and while the community makes up just 2 percent of the population, the Druze account for 3 percent of all career soldiers, according to the military. Many in the community have expressed resentment over the Kamenitz Law, a 2017 amendment to the planning law widely understood to target Arab communities, where building permits are almost impossible to secure, with the result that Arabs build illegally and are then fined or threatened with demolition by the government.
מחאה מול השר אלי כהן בבית העלמין בעספיא. אחד המשתתפים צעק לעברו: "תתביישו לכם, מה עשיתם בשבילנו? הממשלה רק הורסת בתים". מחאה נרשמה גם בבית העלמין קריית שאול בתל אביב @_Gitsis_
צילום: לפי סעיף 27א' לחוק זכות יוצרים pic.twitter.com/W5seYlBrD3
— החדשות – N12 (@N12News) April 21, 2026
Members of the community also protested the law in Isfiya during a memorial event in 2024. In 2023, then-intelligence minister Gila Gamliel was prevented from entering the town’s military cemetery partly because she supported a law that enshrined Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people, which is seen by the Druze community as exclusionary.
At the Kiryat Shaul cemetery in Tel Aviv during a speech by Sofer, protesters held up signs emblazoned with the slogan “Government of death,” which other attendees attempted to take down.
ערוץ 7: קומץ מפגינות הניפו שלט נגד הממשלה במהלך נאומו של השר סופר בטקס בקריית שאול. pic.twitter.com/lVKX0SoyWF
— זירת החדשות (@ZiratNews) April 21, 2026
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