Israelis erupt in protest to demand a cease-fire after 6 more hostages die in Gaza

JERUSALEM — Grieving and angry Israelis surged into the streets Sunday night after six more hostages were found dead in Gaza, chanting “Now! Now!” as they demanded that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reach a cease-fire with Hamas to bring the remaining captives home.

Israel’s largest trade union, the Histadrut, pressured the government by calling a general strike for Monday, the first since the Oct. 7 Hamas attack that started the war. It aims to shut down or disrupt major sectors of the economy, including banking, health care and the country’s main airport.

Tens of thousands of Israelis protested in one of the largest demonstrations since war began nearly 11 months ago. Cease-fire negotiations have dragged on for months, and many blame Netanyahu for failing to reach a deal. Israel’s army has acknowledged the difficulty of rescuing dozens of remaining hostages and said only a deal can bring a large-scale return.

Thousands of people, some of them weeping, gathered outside Netanyahu’s office in Jerusalem. In Tel Aviv, hostages’ relatives marched with coffins to symbolize the toll.

“We really think that the government is making these decisions for its own conservation and not for the lives of the hostages, and we need to tell them, ‘Stop!’” said Shlomit Hacohen, a Tel Aviv resident.

Three of the six hostages found dead — including an Israeli-American — were reportedly scheduled to be released in the first phase of a cease-fire proposal discussed in July, and this only added to the sense of fury and frustration among the protesters.

“Nothing is worse than knowing that they could have been saved,” said Dana Loutaly. “Sometimes it takes something so awful to shake people up and get them out into the streets.”

The military said all six hostages were killed shortly before Israeli forces arrived. Netanyahu blamed the Hamas militant group for the stalled negotiations, saying “whoever murders hostages doesn’t want a deal.”

One hostage was Israeli-American Hersh Goldberg-Polin, 23, a native of Berkeley, California, who lost part of his left arm to a grenade in the attack. In April, a Hamas-issued video showed him alive, sparking new protests in Israel.

The army identified the others as Ori Danino, 25; Eden Yerushalmi, 24; Almog Sarusi, 27; Alexander Lobanov, 33; and Carmel Gat, 40.

The army said the bodies were recovered from a tunnel in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, around a kilometer (half a mile) from where another hostage was rescued alive last week.

Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, a military spokesperson, said Israeli forces found the bodies several dozen meters (yards) underground as “ongoing combat” was underway, but that there was no firefight in the tunnel itself. He said there was no doubt Hamas had killed them.

Hamas has offered to release the hostages in return for an end to the war, the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza and the release of a large number of Palestinian prisoners, including high-profile militants.

Izzat al-Rishq, a senior Hamas official, said the hostages would still be alive if Israel had accepted a U.S.-backed cease-fire proposal that Hamas said it had agreed to in July.

Funerals began, with more outrage. Sarusi’s body was wrapped in an Israeli flag. “You were abandoned on and on, daily, hour after hour, 331 days,” his mother, Nira, said. “You and so many beautiful and pure souls. Enough. No more.”

Hostages’ families urge a ‘complete halt of the country’

Netanyahu has vowed to continue the fighting until Hamas is destroyed. Some Israelis support that as society remains deeply divided on the war.

But critics have accused the prime minister of putting his personal interests over those of the hostages. The war’s end likely will lead to an investigation into his government’s failures in the Oct. 7 attacks, the government’s collapse and early elections.

“I think this is an earthquake. This isn’t just one more step in the war,” said Nomi Bar-Yaacov, associate fellow in the International Security Program at Chatham House, shortly before Sunday’s protests began.

Israel’s Channel 12 reported that Netanyahu got into a shouting match at a security Cabinet meeting Thursday with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who accused him of prioritizing control of a strategic corridor along the Gaza-Egypt border — a major sticking point in the talks — over the lives of the hostages.

An Israeli official confirmed the report and said three of the hostages — Goldberg-Polin, Yerushalmi and Gat — had been slated to be released in the first phase of a cease-fire proposal discussed in July. The official was not authorized to brief media about the negotiations and spoke on condition of anonymity.

“In the name of the state of Israel, I hold their families close to my heart and ask forgiveness,” Gallant said Sunday.

A forum of hostage families has demanded a “complete halt of the country” to push for a cease-fire and hostage release.

Even a mass outpouring of anger would not immediately threaten Netanyahu or his far right government. He still controls a majority in parliament. But he has caved in to public pressure before. Mass protests led him to cancel the dismissal of his defense minister last year, and a general strike last year helped lead to a delay in his controversial judicial overhaul.

A family’s high-profile campaign

Goldberg-Polin’s parents, U.S.-born immigrants to Israel, became perhaps the most high-profile relatives of hostages on the international stage. They met with U.S. President Joe Biden and Pope Francis and on Aug. 21, they addressed the Democratic National Convention — after sustained applause and chants of “bring him home.”

His mother, Rachel, said during the speech that “Hersh, if you can hear us, we love you, stay strong, survive.”

Biden on Sunday said he was “devastated and outraged.” The White House said he spoke with Goldberg-Polin’s parents and offered condolences.

Some 250 hostages were taken on Oct. 7. Israel now believes 101 remain in captivity, including 35 who are thought to be dead. More than 100 were freed during a cease-fire in November in exchange for the release of Palestinians imprisoned by Israel. Eight have been rescued by Israeli forces. Israeli troops mistakenly killed three Israelis who escaped captivity in December.

Hamas-led militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, when they stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7. Israel’s retaliatory offensive in Gaza has killed over 40,000 Palestinians, according to local health officials, who do not say how many were militants.

On Sunday, an Israeli strike hit a car on a road in southern Gaza and killed four Palestinians, according to Aqsa Martyrs Hospital officials and an AP journalist who counted the bodies.

The war has displaced the vast majority of Gaza’s 2.3 million people, often multiple times, and plunged the besieged territory into a humanitarian catastrophe.

Associated Press writers Melanie Lidman in Tel Aviv, Samy Magdy in Cairo, Danica Kirka in London and Darlene Superville in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, contributed to this report.