Tel Aviv, Israel — Nine months into the war in Gaza, Israeli protesters blocked roads across the country on Sunday, calling on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to resign and pushing for a ceasefire to bring back dozens of hostages held by Hamas. .
The demonstrations come as part of long-running efforts to negotiate a truce. gained momentum last week when Hamas abandoned a key demand for an Israeli commitment to end the war. The militant group is still seeking a permanent ceasefire, while Netanyahu has vowed to keep fighting until Hamas is destroyed.
Sunday’s “Day of Disruption” began at 6:29 a.m., the same time Hamas militants launched the first rockets into Israel in the Oct. 7 attack that sparked the war. Protesters blocked main roads and demonstrated outside the homes of government ministers.
Near the Gaza border, Israeli protesters released 1,500 black and yellow balloons to symbolize fellow citizens who were killed and kidnapped.
Hannah Golan said she came to protest the “devastating abandonment of our communities by our government.” And she added: “It’s been nine months since this black day and still no one in our government takes responsibility.”
Palestinian militants killed around 1,200 people in the surprise attack and took another 250 people hostage. Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed more than 38,000 Palestinians, according to the territory’s Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between combatants and civilians in its count.
Some 120 hostages remain captive after more than 100 hostages were freed as part of a ceasefire agreement in November. Israel has already concluded that more than 40 of the remaining hostages are dead and the number is feared to rise as the war drags on.
The United States has united the world behind a proposal for a gradual ceasefire in which Hamas would release remaining captives in exchange for a lasting ceasefire and the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza. But Hamas wants assurances from mediators that the war will end, while Israel wants the freedom to resume fighting if talks on freeing the latest group of hostages drag on.
Netanyahu has also said that Israel is still committed to destroying Hamas’s military and governance capabilities, and that would resume the war after a pause to free the hostages.
Israel continues to battle pockets of Palestinian militants across Gaza after months of intense bombing and ground operations that have devastated the territory’s major cities and displaced most of its population of 2.3 million people, often multiple times. On Sunday, Israel issued new evacuation orders for parts of Gaza City, which was heavily bombed and virtually empty at the start of the war.
The Nasser Hospital in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis said the bodies of three Palestinians were recovered from the Kerem Shalom crossing area with Israel. A statement from the hospital said they were handcuffed and an Associated Press journalist saw one of the bodies with its hands tied.
Abdel-Hadi Ghabaeen, uncle of one of the deceased, said they had been working to ensure the delivery of humanitarian aid and commercial shipments through the crossing. He said he saw soldiers detain them on Saturday and that the bodies showed signs of beatings, one of which had a broken leg.
The Israeli military said it was investigating the reports.
Thousands of Palestinians have been detained since the start of the war, and many of those who have been released, as well as some Israelis who have worked in detention centers, claim that the detainees have been tortured and held in harsh conditions. Israeli authorities have denied abusing prisoners.
Meanwhile, Israeli airstrikes overnight and into Sunday killed at least 13 Palestinians, including the deputy labor secretary of the largely dismantled Hamas-led government.
Ihab al-Ghussein was among four people killed in an attack on a school-turned-shelter in Gaza City, according to the Civil Defense, a first-responder group under the Hamas-led government. Hamas mourned his loss in a statement, saying an attack early in the war destroyed his home and killed his wife and daughter.
The Israeli military said it had struck a militant compound “in the area of a school building” as well as a nearby Hamas weapons manufacturing facility in Gaza City, after taking steps to mitigate damage to civilians.
The Lebanese militant group Hezbollah said early Sunday it launched dozens of projectiles into northern Israel, targeting areas more than 30 kilometers (20 miles) from the border, deeper than most launches. A 28-year-old man was seriously injured, Israel’s national rescue service reported.
Another attack near the border injured three people, one of them seriously, according to the Galilea Medical Center. Israeli media reported that the seriously injured individual was an American citizen. There was no immediate confirmation from the military.
Hezbollah began launching rocket and mortar attacks after the war broke out in Gaza. The scope and severity of Israel’s attacks and counterattacks have increased in recent weeks, raising fears of an all-out war that would catastrophic consequences for people from both sides of the border.
Mediators from the United States, Egypt and Qatar have intensified their efforts last week to broker an agreement between Israel and Hamas. Hezbollah has said It will stop its attacks if there is a ceasefire in Gaza.
The compromise reached on Saturday by Hamas could trigger the first pause in fighting since November and lay the groundwork for new talks, although all sides warned that an agreement is not yet guaranteed.
Washington’s phased deal would begin with a “total and complete” six-week ceasefire during which elderly, sick and female hostages would be freed in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners. During those 42 days, Israeli forces would withdraw from densely populated areas of Gaza and allow displaced people to return to their homes in northern Gaza.
War-weary Palestinians in the Gaza Strip seemed pessimistic, after previous cases in which the two sides appeared to be moving closer to a deal.
“We have lived through nine months of suffering,” said Heba Radi, a mother of six who lives in a tent in the central city of Deir al-Balah, where she has taken refuge since fleeing her home in Gaza City. “The ceasefire has become a distant dream.”
___ Magdy reported from Cairo.
___
This story originally appeared on ABCNews.go.com read the full story
