On the train heading to HaShalom Station in Tel Aviv on Sunday, August 17, late in the afternoon, to demand an end to the war in the Gaza Strip, Naftali Halberstadt, 70, and Ophir Yarden, 67, forcefully criticized Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu. "Everything Bibi does is just to save his own ass," said Halberstadt, a liberal psychologist, to his friend, an academic specializing in Judaism, apologizing for his language. "Netanyahu has never had more than 30 seats [out of 120] in the Knesset with his own party, yet that has given him all the power for so long. No matter what we do. Unless, one day, a general strike brings the country to its knees – then maybe something will happen before the elections," the man in his 70s said.

A fellow passenger overheard them. Mark Frank, 68, a lawyer, was also heading to the protest, organized in front of the Ministry of Defense. He disagreed with his fellow commuter's perspective. "Netanyahu is about ideology," he interjected. "He is the far right, the one who celebrates having killed the Oslo Accords, who thinks like Orban, Le Pen, or Trump. We must not underestimate that dimension and that force. That's also what makes our situation so difficult in the face of the far right."

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