Huge Protests Erupt Across Israel After Bodies Of Six Hostages Are Recovered

Huge protests against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu erupted Sunday after the bodies of six people kidnapped by Hamas on October 7 were found in a tunnel in Gaza.

Demonstrators waving Israeli flags thronged streets in big cities and small towns, demanding that Netanyahu immediately strike a cease-fire deal to free the remaining hostages, CNN reported.

Protesters gathered outside the prime minister's official residence in Jerusalem and aerial footage showed Tel Aviv's main highway blocked by a massive demonstration, Reuters said.

Photos showed some protesters burning tree branches and waving smoke canisters on the Ayalon Highway, where CNN said police fired water cannons and dragged away demonstrators as onlookers chanted, "Officer, who are you keeping safe?"

Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who has clashed with Netanyahu, also called for a deal, and opposition leader and former Prime Minister Yair Lapid urged people to join the demonstration in Tel Aviv, Reuters noted.

The head of Israel's trades union federation, Arnon Bar-David, called for a general strike Monday to pressure the government into signing a deal, and said Ben-Gurion International Airport, Israel's main air transport hub, would be closed from 8 a.m. local time.

"A deal is more important than anything else," Bar-David said.

Netanyahu's office said he apologized and expressed "deep sorrow" while speaking to the family of hostage Alexander Lobanov, whose body was among those recovered.

But relatives of another hostage, Carmel Gat, said they refused to speak to Netanyahu, and called on Israelis to join the protests.

"Take to the streets and shut down the country until everyone returns. They can still be saved," Gat's cousin, Gil Dickmann, wrote on X.

Hamas kidnapped about 250 people during the surprise Oct. 7 attacks that ignited that latest Mideast War, with 101 still in Gaza, according to Reuters.

Israel reportedly believes about one-third of them are dead.

Autopsies showed that hostages whose bodies were recovered Sunday, including Israeli-American Hersh Goldberg-Polin, were killed 48 t0 72 hours earlier by a "number of shots at close range," said a Health Ministry spokesperson.

The Hostage Families Forum blamed Netanyahu, saying the hostages were "all murdered in the last few days, after surviving almost 11 months of abuse, torture, and starvation in Hamas captivity. The delay in signing the deal has led to their deaths and those of many other hostages."

A senior Hamas official also told Reuters that Netanyahu was "responsible for the killing of the Israeli prisoners," who Hamas earlier said died from Israeli "fire and bombing."

In a video statement earlier in the day, Netanyahu said that "while Israel is conducting intensive negotiations with the mediators in a supreme effort to reach a deal, Hamas continues to firmly refuse any offer."

"Whoever murders hostages does not want a deal," he said.

Netanyahu also vowed to seek vengeance.

"I say to the Hamas terrorists who murdered our abductees and I say to their leaders: Your lives are now forfeit," he said.