Day 336 Of The War: A Week Of Protest

There are many people who spend much more time than I do working and demonstrating for the return of the hostages and the removal of this extremist and corrupt government. But this past week, I demonstrated almost every day. On Saturday night, I was in Kaplan. On Sunday, September 1st, the first day of school in Israel, we woke up to the horrible news that Hamas murdered six murdered young hostages. That afternoon, I joined the funeral march of the young members of the hostages’ families, who marched from Dizengoff Plaza toward the Begin Gate, carrying six coffins. It was a heartbreaking march, and on a wagon, there was a huge hourglass symbolizing how time was running out for the hostages. When we arrived, we saw thousands of people. At first, there were no speeches, just people crying out to bring the hostages back. Later, when the speeches began, the families thanked the huge crowd that responded to their plea to gather at Begin and other locations around the country. It was the biggest demonstration since the beginning of the war.

One of the speeches that impressed me was a sad admission by one of the organizers that the families had been “too polite, too nice, and too stately” and didn’t push hard enough. But that was going to change. Netanyahu was recently caught saying that the hostages had suffered, but they hadn’t died. The discovery of the six bodies of the murdered young hostages proves that Netanyahu wasn’t telling the truth, though we were not surprised.

On Monday, I stood with many others on Hapalmach Street in Jerusalem, waiting to pay respects during the funeral procession of Hersh Goldberg Polin. The Jerusalem crowd is very different from the one in Tel Aviv: there were elderly people, religious and Haredi people, all waiting quietly for the procession to pass.

On Tuesday, I worked in the dining room at the Hostage Families’ Headquarters. It was a very quiet day. There wasn’t much to say, but there was lots of food. All kinds of unrelated events were canceled on Sunday and Monday (there was also a general strike on Monday), so the dining room at the headquarters received many food donations.

And then on Thursday, there was another rally, this time we commemorated the death of 27 hostages who died in captivity. 27 coffins covered with the Israeli flag were placed in Habim a square, and following short and sad speeches of family membered, we marched quietly (no chanting) from Habima to Begin Gate.

I don’t know what will finally lead to a hostage deal, but I almost can’t look the family members in the eyes, something must be done now.