Weekly rallies marred by police violence; detained protester threatened by cop
Masses demonstrate in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and elsewhere for hostage deal, against government; Labor MK says she was assaulted by officers despite having parliamentary immunity
Weekly rallies calling for a hostage deal and early elections were held Saturday night in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and other cities across Israel, but were marred by clashes with police and several violent arrests.
Organizers of the Jerusalem demonstration told The Times of Israel that they had witnessed police arresting four protesters on Saturday night, often while using excessive force.
The protests, larger and more impassioned than usual, took place on the backdrop of renewed efforts by the United States to restart hostage negotiations and intensifying anger at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after he told the right-wing Channel 14 news this past week that he was only prepared to sign off on a “partial deal” which would allow Israeli forces to continue fighting in Gaza. (He subsequently said he remained committed to Israel’s latest proposal for a deal to see all hostages freed.)
In Jerusalem, at the weekly protest at Paris Square, outside Netanyahu’s official residence, a police officer cursed and threatened a protester he detained, telling him “I’ll rape your mother” and calling him a “son of a bitch.”
The Israel Police commented on the incident, calling the protester a “provocateur,” but also stating that the officer’s conduct “is not in line with the expected discourse and behavior from every officer, even in turbulent situations like these.
“Therefore, [the incident] will be checked and dealt with accordingly,” the police statement added.
שוטר ניגש למפגין שעוכב בירושלים ומאיים עליו: ״אני אאנוס את אמא שלך. אני לא מזדהה בפניך יבן שרמוטה״ pic.twitter.com/lfA5Mblya4
— רוני גרין שאולוב – Roni Green Shaulov (@Ronigreensha) June 29, 2024
Another protester in Jerusalem was recorded being forcefully arrested by a group of police, one of whom pinned him to the hood of a car and momentarily grabbed his neck, as surrounding protesters shouted not to choke him.
תיעוד: עימותים פרצו בין מפגינים לשוטרים בכיכר פריז בירושלים@VeredPelman pic.twitter.com/WMueckV9Uz
— כאן חדשות (@kann_news) June 29, 2024
Although protesters in Jerusalem have made a habit of attempting to block roads after speeches wrap up, Saturday night saw attempts at civil disobedience from the get-go, with demonstrators chanting “Stop the war” to the beat of drums while clogging the Paris Square intersection.
Police soon pushed the protesters from the road, quickly erecting barricades to prevent them from returning to the junction.
Police break up an anti-war protest outside Bibi's official residence in Jerusalem pic.twitter.com/75kdd88ovl
— Charlie (@cbsu03) June 29, 2024
Clashes also erupted in Tel Aviv, where a rally focused on the plight of the hostages was followed by a fiery protest led by families of captives outside the headquarters of the powerful Histadrut labor federation.
Labor MK Naama Lazimi was filmed being shoved and grabbed by police officers, despite the parliamentary immunity granted to her as a Knesset member.
She told media outlets that “policemen assaulted” her and pulled her hair while she was “trying to help another protester.”
The protesters lit a fire outside the office and urged the union chairman, Arnon Bar-David, to call a general strike and shut down the Israeli economy in order to pressure the government into reaching a deal with terror group Hamas to release the 120 hostages it is holding captive in Gaza.
שוטרים התנפלו על ח״כ נעמה לזימי, תפסו ודחפו אותה ונתנו לה מכה בפנים לאחר שניסתה לסייע לעצורה. פשוט בושה וחרפה. זו פעם נוספת שבה שוטרי משטרת ישראל משתמשים באלימות נגד חברת הכנסת שמסייעת למוחים נגד האלימות המשטרתית pic.twitter.com/LVn7ecliTg
— בר שם-אור Bar Shem-Ur (@Bar_ShemUr) June 29, 2024
When Lazimi stepped between a group of protesting hostage families and police, the latter group dragged her away. The politician later tweeted that violence against family members of the hostages and activists for the hostages’ return has become “routine.”
“This is the government’s police and not a public police, but they won’t scare me or us. The police will be restored and rebuilt,” she continued.
Police claimed Lazimi had been trying to prevent cops from confiscating the phone of a protester arrested for lighting a fire on the road.
“Contrary to her claims about allegedly being hurt by police officers, and in order to prevent misleading of the public and defamation of cops, we clarify that in practice, the Knesset member is using her immunity to disturb officers trying to do their job,” the force said. “We regret that a public official is behaving provocatively.”
Earlier, at the weekly rally of the Hostages and Missing Families Forum in Tel Aviv’s Hostages Square — which was calmer than the surrounding anti-government rallies in the city — many siblings of hostages took to the stage.
Among them was Danny Elgarat, the brother of hostage Itzik Elgarat, who was abducted from Kibbutz Nir Oz on October 7. Elgarat cast doubt on the efficacy of military operations — like the one in which four hostages were freed on June 8 — in bringing back the rest of the abductees.
“These rescue operations here and there will not remedy the situation,” he said, arguing instead for a ceasefire deal with Hamas that includes an exchange of hostages for Palestinian security prisoners.
The mother of Tamir Adar, whose body was taken to Gaza after he was killed fighting terrorists at Nir Oz, implored decision-makers not to deprioritize the return of hostages’ remains.
Yael Adar began her address by noting her late son’s 39th birthday. “I became a mother 39 years ago,” she said of the birth of her first-born, adding that she had felt ashamed when Yaakov Amidror, a former head of the National Security Council, recently said that of the remaining hostages in Gaza, “30-40 are no longer living.”
She charged that his remarks downplayed the significance of retrieving their bodies — “but burial is a basic right, not a luxury.”
Her speech was preceded by that of her daughter Roni, who spoke of the pain of watching her brother’s young children grow up without him.
A few blocks away, another group of hostage families demonstrated under Begin Gate outside the Kirya military headquarters, before continuing to the Histadrut headquarters to demand a general strike.
Anti-government groups have also said they are organizing a shutdown of businesses and commerce on July 7, marking nine months to the day of Hamas’s shock assault, which protest groups accuse the government of failing to prevent.
Over the past week, protest leaders had campaigned for a shutdown of commerce on Thursday, but the call went largely unheeded.
The war in Gaza erupted after Hamas’s October 7 massacre, which saw some 3,000 terrorists burst across the border into Israel by land, air and sea, killing some 1,200 people and seizing 251 hostages, mostly civilians, many amid acts of brutality and sexual assault.
It is believed that 116 of the 251 hostages seized by Hamas on October 7 remain in captivity, after 105 civilians were released during a week-long truce in late November. Four were released prior to that, and seven, including Argamani, were rescued by Israeli forces. The bodies of 19 hostages have also been recovered, including three mistakenly killed by the IDF.
The IDF has confirmed the deaths of 42 of those still held by Hamas, and one more person has been listed as missing since October 7, and their fate is still unknown. Hamas has also been holding two Israeli civilians who entered the Strip in 2014 and 2015, as well as the bodies of two IDF soldiers who were killed in 2014.
