Israelis gathered across the country on Monday for the first national day of mourning since the Hamas-led attacks on October 7, with protesters disrupting several ceremonies as they demanded that government ministers do more to secure the release of the hostages. .
Memorial Day in Israel is often one of the most somber on the country’s calendar, a date when Israelis put aside their differences to mourn their fellow citizens killed in war or terrorist attacks. But Monday’s protests underscored how feelings of wartime unity have given way to deep disputes over the war in the Gaza Strip, the fate of the hostages taken on Oct. 7 and domestic politics.
Critics booed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as he attended a funeral at Mount Herzl in Jerusalem, the site of Israel’s national cemetery. A person was heard shouting: “Trash.” Another said: “You took my children.”
At a ceremony in Ashdod on the Mediterranean coast, passersby shouted at national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, calling him a “criminal,” before his supporters tried to silence them.
While the government has managed to secure the release of more than 100 hostages kidnapped by Hamas in the attacks, at least half of the approximately 240 people who were taken are dead or remain in captivity. Many of their loved ones want the government to agree to an immediate ceasefire with Hamas that would allow the release of the remaining captives, even if it means leaving Hamas in control of parts of Gaza.
Disruptions are unprecedented. Protesters mocked Ben-Gvir and other ministers last year, before the war began, when anger over the government’s efforts to reform the justice system was the biggest source of social division.
This year’s protests reflected growing anguish among sections of the population over the way Netanyahu’s right-wing coalition government has handled the war, causing huge casualties and destruction.
Netanyahu has repeatedly promised a complete victory over Hamas. But the fighting in the Gaza Strip in recent days has underscored the notion that Hamas militants remain a force in the territory and could remain so for a long time. The pattern that has emerged in the war is that, after pitched battles, the Israeli army declares that it has taken control of an area and then advances, only for Hamas fighters to return and reconstitute their forces.
On Monday, Israeli airstrikes shook the northern and southern reaches of the territory, and the Israeli military said it had struck more than 120 targets in the past 24 hours. Ground troops also clashed with Hamas fighters in several locations, the Israeli military said. Amid the fighting, tens of thousands of fleeing civilians continued a desperate search for safety.
Fighting appeared to be heaviest in Gaza City, Beit Lahia and Jabaliya in northern Gaza, and in Rafah, the southern city where more than a million Palestinians had fled to try to escape Israel’s further military offensive. to the north. In recent days, hundreds of thousands have left Rafah, according to the United Nations.
Hamas said on Monday it had fired mortars at Israeli soldiers near the Rafah crossing, which links Gaza and Egypt and has been closed since Israel seized it last week.
A United Nations spokesman said Monday that a U.N. staff member was killed Monday morning when a U.N. vehicle was hit while en route to a hospital in Rafah. Around 200 United Nations staff have been killed in the conflict.
Israeli society closed ranks behind the government and army immediately after the Hamas-led attack on October 7. But critics increasingly blame Netanyahu for failing to prevent the attacks, which Israeli authorities say killed about 1,200 people, and for prolonging the war without winning. the return of the hostages.
A poll this month by the Israel Democracy Institute, a Jerusalem-based research group, suggests that most Israelis see a hostage deal as a priority over a military operation in Rafah. Israeli officials consider the city to be the last major Hamas stronghold in Gaza, with battalions of fighters hidden there, but US officials say the group’s leaders in the territory are hiding in the city of Khan Younis, not Rafah.
Israel and Hamas have not agreed to a ceasefire or the release of hostages, despite months of mediation. And Netanyahu has insisted that Israeli forces will invade Rafah, with or without that deal, amid threats from his far-right coalition partners to overthrow the government if the war ends without the complete defeat of Hamas.
At a Memorial Day ceremony in Holon, central Israel, on Monday, heers shouted at Miri Regev, the transportation minister, and asked her to resign. One asked: “What about the hostages?”
As Defense Minister Yoav Gallant attended a ceremony in Tel Aviv, a protester held up a sign that read: “His blood is on your hands.”
On Sunday night, Israeli peace activists broadcast their annual joint Palestinian-Israeli Memorial Day ceremony, with side events in London, New York and Los Angeles.
The ceremony is organized by Fighters for Peace and the Circle of Parents and Families Forum, two peacebuilding organizations, and seeks to recognize not only Israeli pain, but also the cost of Palestinian suffering over decades.
The ceremony, held annually since 2006, was pre-recorded this year to avoid the possibility of disruption by protesters. It included speeches, songs, a poem about peace, and a video showing children in Israel and the Israeli-occupied West Bank talking about the effects of war.
Palestinians in the West Bank did not participate in person, as Israel stopped allowing many Palestinians to work in Israel after the October 7 attacks. There were also no direct contributions from speakers in Gaza.
More than 35,000 people have died in Gaza during the Israeli military campaign to defeat Hamas, mostly children and women, health officials there say. Almost everyone in Gaza has been displaced from their homes amid a hunger crisis that aid workers say has been largely caused by Israeli restrictions on aid delivery to the enclave.
The peace groups’ ceremony, which was screened in more than 200 locations in Israel, reflected the diversity and complexity of opinions within Israeli society about the war. Several speakers discussed their hope that generations of bloodshed would end and that peace would be achieved.
Ghadir Hani read a contribution from a woman in Gaza, whose name was given only as Najla, who described how she had lost 20 members of her family in the war, including her brother, a father of two, who she said had died. while he was going to look for food for his parents.
“They killed him as he walked down the street, although they posed no threat,” Ms Hani read. “The death machine is still ready to kill,” she added. “But I know that on the other side there are many people who believe in peace.”
liam stack and Lauren Leatherby contributed with reports.