About 1,000 people gathered on Thursday night at Tel Aviv’s Habima Square for an anti-war protest organized by an Israeli-Palestinian coalition of peace activists and human rights groups, which included calls for soldiers to refuse to serve in the war.
Speakers also assailed Israel’s actions in the West Bank and the release from jail of a settler accused of having shot dead Palestinian activist Awdah Hathaleen this week, even as Hathaleen’s relatives remain in prison.
In a rare occurrence for a Tel Aviv protest of this size, one of the speakers at the demonstration, actor Yossi Zabari, explicitly accused Israel of genocide — “the word that frightens us more than the deed itself,” he said.
Israel has long rejected claims by the international community and human rights organizations that it is committing genocide in Gaza, saying that it makes efforts to prevent civilian harm, which are hindered by Hamas’s use of Gaza’s civilians as human shields.
Protesters hoisted pictures of emaciated Gazan children and Israeli hostages. A large screen on stage read, in Hebrew and Arabic, “Enough with the killing, enough with the starvation, enough with the abandonment.”
“Right now in Gaza, there is a little girl hungry for food and a little boy thirsty for water,” said Rula Daoud, a co-leader of the binational socialist group Standing Together. “I don’t know how much energy the boy and girl have left in their bodies to shout, but I know I can shout for them.” She called for a joint Jewish-Arab struggle “to sabotage life here until the government breaks.”
“We must not think that it’s not our responsibility and that we have nothing to do, because it’s possible to refuse, and it’s a duty to refuse to serve this war,” she said, as the crowd chanted: “Refuse.”
Activist Ghadir Hani, who introduced herself to applause as “an Arab-Palestinian citizen of Israel,” said in her speech that starting Sunday, dozens of peace groups will set up a “struggle tent” on nearby Dizengoff Square, “from which actions of disruption and incessant struggle will go out.”
“We won’t stop until the war of annihilation is over and the government of death is out of here,” she said.
Hani also played a video address to the demonstration by a man she introduced as “Rami, a resident of the Gaza Strip, whose family was displaced from its home and is struggling with hunger.”
Rami said he follows anti-war protests in Israel from afar, and expresses appreciation for protests that exhibit pictures of children killed by Israel.
“It shows we feel each other’s pain,” he said.
Two former IAF pilots — Maj. (res.) Hagai Tamir and Lt. Col. (res.) David Yisraeli — addressed current pilots, saying: “Refuse to carry out war crimes. Don’t close your eyes in the face of the consequences of your actions.”
Police arrested one protester after ordering demonstrators to clear Ben Tziyon Boulevard. The protesters then marched toward the Likud party headquarters on King George Street, where they sat down and lit a fire. Police shoved some of them to the ground.
War broke out between Israel and Hamas on October 7, 2023, when Hamas-led terrorists invaded Israel, killing some 1,200 people and kidnapping 251. Of the 50 hostages remaining in Gaza, the Israel Defense Forces have confirmed the deaths of 28.
The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry says more than 60,000 people in the Strip have been killed or are presumed dead in the fighting so far, though the toll cannot be verified and does not differentiate between civilians and fighters. Israel says it has killed some 20,000 combatants in battle as of January and another 1,600 terrorists inside Israel during the October 7 onslaught.
The international community and human rights organizations are warning of a looming famine in Gaza because of the insufficient amount of humanitarian aid entering the coastal enclave.