Thousands gathered in Tel Aviv on Saturday (Oct 24) for a large anti-government demonstration, three days ahead of a general election widely viewed as a referendum on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The protest was organised by the October Council, a group founded by the families of victims and hostages taken by Palestinian militants on Oct 7, 2023, to demand accountability for the failure to prevent the Hamas attack that sparked the Gaza war.

According to Israeli media, the gathering saw the participation of the leaders of the four main opposition parties, including Gadi Eisenkot, the former military chief of staff who is neck and neck with Netanyahu and who received a warm reception from the crowd.

"Three days before the election, we will hold the culminating event marking three years of struggle to uncover the truth, demand accountability, and establish a state commission of inquiry," the October Council wrote on X ahead of the rally.

The latest polls published before a gag period entered into force on Friday night showed that neither bloc would obtain a majority of seats in Israel's parliament. A poll published by public broadcaster KAN found that out of 120 seats in the Israeli parliament, 52 would go to Eisenkot's bloc and 50 to Netanyahu's, with the rest going to non-aligned parties, including Arab ones.

An AFP reporter said thousands were marching from the central Rabin Square towards Hostages Square, a focal point for past anti-government protests to demand the release of those held captive in Gaza.

"Whoever has been leading us for the past four years (since Netanyahu's government took office in late 2022) has done such a terrible job," Hadas Feuershtein, 68, told AFP shortly before the start of the rally.

"Israel has never been in a situation as it is now," she added.

Ahead of the rally, the October Council had alerted law enforcement of possible "provocations" from pro-government agitators.

The Israeli police said on Saturday evening that it "arrested a suspect for assaulting the security team of a public figure" in Tel Aviv, with the Israeli press identifying the target as former Prime Minister and opposition party leader Naftali Bennett.

The rally came after years of campaigning by Israeli civil society and opposition parties to establish an independent commission of inquiry on the security failures that led to Oct 7.

Netanyahu's government has refused to establish such an independent body, the likes of which Israel has commonly set up in the past to investigate major state-level failings.

It has instead offered to create a "political" commission, half of whose members would be appointed by the ruling coalition and half by opposition lawmakers.

Opposition leaders however said they would boycott a commission appointed by politicians.

As the campaign draws to an end, Eisenkot and Bennett are expected to hold separate last meetings with voters in Tel Aviv on Sunday evening.

No ‘bbCoin’

First-time voter Naama Bitterman, 18, said at Saturday's rally that she was confident the anti-Netanyahu bloc she supports would have the upper hand in the vote and improve Israel's international standing, tarnished by three years of war in Gaza, Lebanon and Iran and surging violence in the occupied West Bank.

"I think that if we win, and we are going to win, we can change how other people in the entire world see us," she told AFP.

Britain and several other countries imposed sanctions targeting goods from Israeli settlements in the West Bank in response to a wave of settler attacks on Palestinians and settlement construction approved by Netanyahu's right-wing government.

To circumvent Israel's growing international isolation, Netanyahu suggested Friday that Israel may need to develop an alternate digital economy.

Netanyahu, who has previously called for Israel to become self-sufficient militarily, also said that multibillion-dollar weapons packages from key ally Washington "won't keep coming."

Opposition leaders on Saturday lambasted the premier's suggestion.

Eisenkot sarcastically referred to the proposed parallel digital currency as "bbCoin," using a common nickname for the premier, Bibi.

"Netanyahu says that if he is elected again, Israel will disconnect from the global economy. No online shopping, no investments in high-tech, no security. We must not let bbCoin destroy Israel," he wrote on X.

Yair Lapid, a former prime minister and current leader of the opposition, accused Netanyahu of "promising Israeli citizens before the elections that they will stand in line for an hour and a half for bread like in Russia or Iran".

"If he wins the elections, that's what will happen: there will be sanctions, there will be no security agreement with the United States... and there will be no Israeli economy," he said in an interview with Israel's Channel 12.

Source: AFP
– Agencies