Following the government decision last week to approve budget cuts and tax hikes, and with the issue of universal army or national service still up in the air, thousands of social justice protesters took part in two separate rallies in Tel Aviv on Saturday night, as one event represented a bid to unify the social protest movement and the right-wing movement for a universal IDF draft, with the other mostly comprised by social protest activists who disagreed with the “unity” attempt, among them: Hadash and Communist Party of Israel activists.
Protesters take to the streets of Tel Aviv on Saturday (August 4, 2012), during a protest for social justice (Photo: Activestills)
The protest held at the Tel Aviv Museum under the banner “Enough!” and was billed as a “unity rally” bringing together protest leaders Itzik Shmuli, head of the National Union of Israeli Students, Stav Shafir of the social justice movement as well as Boaz Nol and others from the Camp Sucker universal service movement. Organizers said the demonstration was held because of the new social spending cuts and increased taxes, which they say will only increase the cost of living. While it was hyped as a unity rally that would bring the movement to a new level of impact or a decisive phase of some kind, the crowd at the museum was quite thin, numbering only a few thousand.
Things became contentious when dozens of protesters from the more militant rally, at the Habima Theater, arrived with megaphones and began shouting down the speakers, telling them to go home and calling them “Bibi [Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu]’s collaborators.” Some of the activists attempted to disrupt the rally taking place at the museum plaza, forcefully trying to break through the barriers that were separating between the crowds and the stage. “Hypocrites, go away, you are appointed by the tycoons” shouted members of the militant rally, who call themselves the “unfriendlies.” Many also chanted, “The Arabs and haredim (ultra-orthodox Jews) are not our enemy,” in a rebuke to the call for universal service. Speakers on stage pleaded for calm, but for a time, events grew out of control as counter-protesters charged the barricades and security personnel pulled them away.
At the Habima gathering, one group of people carried large matchsticks made of papier mâché, an allusion to Moshe Silman, who in July set himself aflame in protest of the government’s economic policies and later died of his injuries. The largest contingent waved banners of Hadash and red flags. “Besides the economic policies, [we’re here to protest] the government’s aggressive policies toward
Organizers of the Habima march said that four event pages set up on Facebook for the demonstration had mysteriously disappeared, one by one, over the course of the week. Protests were marred with the arrest of one activist, who police said stole a tear gas canister from one of the policemen, and sprayed another policeman who was videotaping the rally. However, activists present at the event said that the man in question was himself sprayed by an undercover policeman. Later, police confronted protesters who had been blocking the road near government offices in Tel Aviv, with some arrests reported. Eight people were arrested in total throughout the events.
