Israelis are called on Monday, September 2 to “a general strike” to force the government to conclude a deal to release hostages held in Gaza, after the army discovered six dead hostages in a tunnel.
From 6am on Monday (5am in France), “The entire Israeli economy will be on general strike”the head of the powerful Israeli trade union centre, Arnon Bar-David, launched on Sunday, because “We must stop this abandonment of hostages”. “At 8am the airport will be closed, takeoffs and landings will cease”the Histadrut said in a press release.
On Sunday, tens of thousands of Israelis demonstrated in several cities to demand an agreement on the release of hostages. In Tel Aviv, protesters blocked a highway.
This mobilization follows the announcement on Sunday, September 1, by the Israeli army of the discovery of the bodies of six hostages in the Gaza Strip, the scene of a devastating war that has pitted Israel against the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas for nearly eleven months.
“The bodies of hostages Carmel Gat, Eden Yerushalmi, Hersh Goldberg-Polin, Alexander Lobanov, Almog Sarusi and Ori Danino” They were found on Saturday in a “tunnel in the Rafah area”in the southern Gaza Strip, the military said, sparking shock and anger in Israel.
US President Joe Biden said ” devastated “ AND “indignant”while his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, expressed his “stupor” and asked “stop the war”.
Hostages killed “at point-blank range” according to Israel, by Israeli “bombing” according to Hamas
At least four hostages were buried on Sunday, in the presence of grieving relatives.
“You were abandoned, every day, every hour, 331 days (…) You were sacrificed to “destroy Hamas””Nira Seroussi lamented at the eulogy for her son Almog. She was referring to repeated statements by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has vowed to continue the war until the destruction of Hamas, an organization considered a terrorist by Israel, the United States and the European Union. Under mounting pressure to reach a hostage deal after months of stalemate, Netanyahu on Sunday threatened Hamas with “settle your account”.
According to the Israeli Ministry of Health, the autopsy performed on the bodies of the six hostages reveals that they were murdered. “point blank” “between Thursday and Friday morning”But according to a Hamas official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, they were “killed by gunfire and bombing by the occupier” Israelis, some being part “from the list of hostages to be released that Hamas had approved”.
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During the unprecedented Hamas attack on Israel that sparked the war in the Gaza Strip on October 7, 251 people were kidnapped: 97 are still detained in Gaza, including 33 declared dead by the army. This attack resulted in the deaths of 1,205 people on the Israeli side, most of them civilians, according to an AFP count based on official data.
Polio vaccination in Gaza
According to reports, Israeli retaliation has left at least 40,738 people dead in Gaza, a figure that cannot be independently verified, according to the Hamas Ministry of Health. The war has also caused a humanitarian and health catastrophe and the displacement of almost all of the 2.4 million inhabitants. According to the UN, the majority of the dead are women and children.
On Sunday, the center of the besieged Palestinian territory experienced a few hours of respite, following the official launch of a wide-ranging anti-polio campaign thanks to “humanitarian pauses” The campaign will last three days, from 6 a.m. to 2 p.m. The aim is to vaccinate more than 640,000 children under the age of ten, following the first confirmed case of the disease in Palestinian territory in 25 years. According to the Gaza Ministry of Health, 72,611 children were vaccinated on the first day of the polio campaign.
Israel is also continuing its military operation launched on Wednesday in the West Bank, a Palestinian territory separated from the Gaza Strip and occupied by Israel since 1967. Loud explosions were heard near the Jenin refugee camp on Sunday, from where a thick cloud of smoke rose.
At least twenty-four Palestinians, mainly “terrorists” According to the military, they have been killed by Israeli troops in the West Bank since Wednesday, according to the Palestinian Authority’s Health Ministry.
Hamas, which has been in power in Gaza since 2007, and Islamic Jihad, another armed group, said at least 14 of those killed were fighting in their ranks.
In the southern West Bank, three Israeli police officers, including a woman, were killed on Sunday near a checkpoint in a “armed attack”according to Israeli police. A Palestinian suspected of being the perpetrator was shot dead by the army, it said.
