Israel: The country’s largest union declared a strike over the 6 dead hostages – Pressure mounts for an agreement

Tel Aviv’s municipal services will participate in tomorrow’s strike in solidarity with the Israeli hostages and their families, according to a post today on the city’s Facebook page.

The strike will take place alongside many other municipalities in Israel following the discovery of the bodies of six Israeli hostages.

Additionally, the head of Israel’s largest union, the Histadrut, called for a general strike tomorrow starting at 6 a.m. local time to pressure the government into reaching an agreement for the return of the Israeli hostages still held in Gaza by Hamas.

Arnon Bar-David, whose union represents hundreds of thousands of workers, called on all public sector employees to join the strike and said that Ben Gurion Airport, Israel’s main airport, should close from 8 a.m.

Israeli Defense Minister calls for an agreement to release the hostages

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant today urged Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to finalize a ceasefire agreement with Hamas so that the hostages from Gaza can return to their homes, as the bodies of six hostages captured on October 7 were returned to their families.

“It’s too late for the hostages who were coldly murdered. The hostages still in Hamas’s hands must return to their homes,” Gallant wrote on X.

“The Security Cabinet must convene immediately and revoke the decision made on Thursday,” Gallant said, referring to the cabinet’s decision to maintain a permanent Israeli military presence in the so-called Philadelphi Corridor, a narrow strip of land along the Egypt-Gaza border.

Netanyahu’s insistence on keeping troops in this corridor to prevent Hamas from smuggling weapons from Egypt is widely seen as one of the main obstacles to reaching an agreement with Hamas in talks mediated by Egypt and Qatar.

Gallant has repeatedly clashed with Netanyahu and hardline religious nationalist ministers over the need for an agreement to end the war in Gaza and secure the release of the remaining hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners held in Israel.

Approximately one-third of the 101 Israeli and foreign hostages in Gaza are believed to be dead, while the fate of the others is unknown.

Today, the Israeli prime minister threatened to “settle the scores” with Hamas. “Anyone who murders hostages does not want an agreement” for a ceasefire and the release of Israeli hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, Netanyahu said, threatening the Palestinian Islamist organization: “We will hunt you down, we will catch you, and we will settle the scores.”

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