WATCH: Israelis Hold Sabbath Meal in Tel Aviv with Empty Table for Hostages

TEL AVIV, Israel — A long table, carefully laid for the Sabbath meal. Candles, wine and bread, carefully laid out, with glasses and beautiful place settings. But each chair is empty, and each bears a placard with a shadow and the word “hostage” printed on it.

This is a performance, and a protest, that activists have staged for several weeks in a row, together with the family and friends of the 240 hostages who were taken from Israel by Hamas terrorists on October 7, and the dozens who are still missing.

In the plaza in front of the Tel Aviv Museum of Art — which has been renamed “Kidnapped Square” — the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, an organization that was founded shortly after the October 7 attack, has added new displays and demonstrations.

One that was featured on Friday was a floral sculpture from which posters featuring each of the 30 children being held by Hamas– including one as young as nine months old — were suspended.

Joel B. Pollak / Breitbart News

Other, similar art displays filled the square. A group of tents was fenced off: these are the tents of several families who have begun camping out in the square, declaring that they will not return to their normal lives until all of the hostages are home. Several held a banner in protest: “Everything stops until they are returned.”

Friday’s event featured performances by popular Israeli musicians. One led the crowd in a stirring rendition of Israel’s national anthem, “Hatikvah,” or “The Hope.”

Joel B. Pollak / Breitbart News

Thus far, four hostages have been returned by Hamas, and one was freed by Israeli troops.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the new biography, Rhoda: ‘Comrade Kadalie, You Are Out of Order’. He is also the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.