Slain hostage’s brother likens Netanyahu to Purim villain Haman: ‘We’ll put you on trial’

Dani Elgarat, brother of slain hostage Itzik Elgarat, says Israelis will put Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “on trial for crimes against the nation of Israel.”

“Netanyahu — it’s happening,” he says to some 2,500 people at the weekly anti-government, pro-hostage deal protest on Tel Aviv’s Begin Road outside the IDF headquarters. “What you see here today is an uprising.”

He urges heads of the private sector to join the uprising. “Shut down the malls, banks, tech sector,” he says.

“Come save the country,” Elgarat continues. “The life of the country depends on the life of the hostages.”

In the spirit of Purim, Elgarat likens the premier to Haman, who, in the Book of Esther, tries to exterminate the Jews of the Persian Empire.

As Elgarat speaks, some protesters wave groggers, noise-makers traditionally sounded each time Haman is mentioned in the scroll, to smite the Purim villain’s name.

Meirav Angrest Rahamim, aunt of captive soldier Matan Angrest, also tears into Netanyahu, accusing him of making her wounded nephew into “a third-class citizen abandoned in captivity.”

Matan Angrest is slated for return only in the ceasefire-hostage deal’s second phase, which would require Israel to withdraw from Gaza and end the war against Hamas — a red line for Netanyahu’s right-wing flank, which has threatened to topple the government.

No male soldiers were released in the 42-day first phase that ended March 2, during which Hamas released 33 “humanitarian cases.”

Angrest Rahamim accuses Netanyahu and his government of “striving to start the next phase of the war, instead of the next phase of the deal that you signed.”