Its citizens Israelis are called to take part en masse in a “general strike” todayto force the Prime Minister’s government Benjamin Netanyahu to conclude a ceasefire agreement and the release of the hostages held by Hamas in the Gaza Strip, the day after the Israeli army recovered the bodies of six hostages in an underground tunnel.

From 06:00 (local time and Greek time), “the entire Israeli economy will be in a general strike,” the head of the powerful central confederation of labor unions, Arnon Bar David, lamented yesterday, as “we must manage to end this abandonment of hostages”.

“At 08:00 the airport will be closed, take-offs and landings will stop,” the confederation HISTADRUT said.

Yesterday, hundreds of thousands of Israelis – as many as half a million, according to media estimates – demonstrated in various cities to demand, once again, that an agreement be made for the release of the hostages. At Tel Avivprotesters blocked a highway. Television networks broadcast footage of police using water cannons against protesters. The authorities spoke of 29 arrests.

The demonstrations were recorded after the announcement yesterday by the Israeli armed forces that the bodies of six hostages were found in the Gaza Strip, theater of a devastating war, which on Saturday will close eleven months, between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist movement that rules the enclave.

The Minister of Defence Joab Galladwho frequently clashes with Prime Minister Netanyahu, also called yesterday for a deal, while opposition leader former Prime Minister Yair Lapidcalled on citizens to descend on the demonstration yesterday in Tel Aviv.

In a last-minute bid to prevent a 24-hour strike, the far-right finance minister Bezalel Smotricha member of the government’s national security council, asked the judiciary to declare the mobilization illegal.

The bodies of six hostages, including two women, were found yesterday Saturday in a “tunnel in the Rafah zone”, in the southern part of the Gaza Strip, the armed forces said, shocking and angering many in Israel.

US President Joe Biden said he was “devastated” and “outraged”, his French counterpart said he was “disgusted” and demanded that “the war stop”.

At least four of the hostages were buried yesterday, with grieving families in attendance.

“They abandoned you, every day, every hour, for 331 days (…) they sacrificed you to ‘destroy Hamas,'” said Nira Serousi, saying goodbye to her child at the funeral of her son Almog.

He was referring to the statements made in practice every day by Prime Minister Netanyahu, who vows to continue the war until the annihilation of Hamas, which Israel classifies as a terrorist organization, as do the US and the EU.

Mr. Netanyahu, under pressure for months to conclude a deal for the hostages, after months of absolute deadlock, declared yesterday that he would “settle the score” with Hamas.

According to the Israeli Ministry of Health, the autopsy performed on the bodies of the six hostages showed that they were killed by bullets almost “from contact” between “Thursday and Friday morning”.

Instead, a Hamas official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told AFP that the victims were “killed by (Israeli) gunfire and shelling,” noting that all six victims were included “on a list of hostages to be released.” endorsed by the Palestinian movement.

Israelis will now have to “choose: either Netanyahu or the deal,” another Hamas official told Reuters news agency.

Months of negotiations mediated by Qatar, Egypt and the US have so far failed to produce an agreement despite pressure from Washington.

Speaking on Al Jazeera television yesterday, Khalil Al Hayya, Hamas’s top negotiator, reiterated that the movement will not accept any deal unless it provides for the complete withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from the Gaza Strip, including the so-called corridors of Philadelphia and Nezarim, which has turned into a major obstacle in the talks.

During the unprecedented raid by the military arm of Hamas in the southern part of the Israeli territory on October 7, 2023, 251 people were kidnapped. Of these, 97 remain in the enclave, but 33 of them have been declared dead by the Israeli army.

Hamas’ raid on Israel killed 1,205 people on the Israeli side, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official data.

Israel’s large-scale military retaliatory operations have so far killed at least 40,738 people in the Gaza Strip, according to the Hamas health ministry, caused a humanitarian and health disaster and displaced almost the entire population of 2.4 million. According to the UN, the majority of victims were women and children.

Yesterday the central part of the besieged Palestinian enclave experienced a few hours of respite as a major polio vaccination campaign began, thanks to three-day “humanitarian pauses”, from 06:00 to 14:00.

The aim is to vaccinate more than 640,000 children under the age of ten, following the confirmation of the first case of the disease in the Gaza Strip in 25 years.

According to the Ministry of Health in Gaza, 72,611 children were vaccinated against polio on the first day of the campaign.

At the same time, Israel continues the wide-ranging military operation it launched last Wednesday in the occupied West Bank since 1967.

Heavy explosions were heard for hours yesterday near the refugee camp in Jenin, where thick clouds of smoke rose.

At least 24 Palestinians, including militants, have been killed by the Israeli army in the West Bank, according to the Palestinian Authority’s health ministry. All the victims were “terrorists”, the Israeli army claims.

Hamas, in power in the Gaza Strip since 2007, and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, another armed movement, have announced that 14 of their members were killed.

In the southern West Bank, three Israeli police officers, including a woman, were killed yesterday near a checkpoint during an “armed attack”, according to police. A Palestinian who was allegedly the attacker was killed by the armed forces, according to the same source.