JERUSALEM, Israel — Thousands of Israelis demonstrated in front of government buildings Thursday night to demand victory in the war against Hamas, and to urge Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to reject any hostage deal that allows Hamas to survive.
The rally was billed as a celebration of the miluimnikim, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) reservists, many of whom volunteered to fight even after they were considered too old to serve, and even if their units had not specifically been called up to active duty.
Many of them live in Judea and Samaria, also known as the West Bank, where opinions tend to be right-wing and very supportive of the military. After October 7, 300,000 reservists responded to the IDF’s callup — when the military only needed about 150,000.
Many of the speakers had lost sons or fathers who had fallen in battle, either on October 7 or in Gaza. All of them stressed the idea that their loved ones would have wanted Israel to fight on to victory — not to accept a weak ceasefire deal that left Hamas intact.
Itzik Bontzel, whose paratrooper son, Amit, fell in Gaza fighting Hama, led the crowd in chants of “Nitzachon!” (“Victory”), and said: “You don’t negotiate with enemies, you defeat them.” Rabbi Benny Kalmanson, whose son, Elchanan, died defending Kibbutz Be’eri, said: “We either have leaders who will win, or we will have neighbors who are murdered.”
The rally came on the same day that U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken wrapped up a visit in which he publicly pressured Israel to accept a deal with Hamas that would leave the terrorists in power, and accused Israel of trying to “dehumanize” Palestinians.
October 7, Gilad Ach, head of a reservists’ organization, told the crowd that the Biden administration should not try to dictate terms to Israel — nor should the Israeli government obey them. “We will not let you … turn Israel into an American protectorate,” he said.
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 recent book, “The Zionist Conspiracy (and how to join it),” now available on Audible. He is also the author of the 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.