Police fired water cannon and made numerous arrests as scuffles broke out during the protests in Tel Aviv and close to the prime minister’s residence in Jerusalem, where police said dozens of protesters tried to break through security cordons.
Over the past three days, demonstrators protesting against the move to sack Shin Bet head Ronen Bar have joined forces with protesters angry at the decision to resume fighting in Gaza, breaking a two-month-old ceasefire, while 59 Israeli hostages remain in the Palestinian enclave.
“We’re very, very worried that our country is becoming a dictatorship,” Rinat Hadashi, 59, said in Jerusalem, adding, “They’re abandoning our hostages, they’re neglecting all the important things for this country.”
Netanyahu stated this week he had lost confidence in Bar, who has led Shin Bet since 2021, and intended to dismiss him.
The decision followed months of tension between the two over a corruption investigation into allegations that a number of aides in Netanyahu’s office were offered bribes by figures connected with Qatar.
Netanyahu has dismissed the accusation as a politically motivated attempt to unseat him but his critics have accused him of undermining the institutions underpinning Israel’s democracy by seeking Bar’s removal.
In a letter to the government that was distributed by Shin Bet as ministers met to formally approve his dismissal, Bar said the decision was founded on “baseless claims that are nothing more than a disguise for completely different, extraneous and fundamentally unacceptable motives.”
He has already announced that he intended to step down early to take responsibility for the intelligence failures that allowed the attack on Israel on Oct 7, 2023, to take place.
The angry scenes on Thursday highlighted divisions that have deepened since Netanyahu returned to power as head of a right-wing coalition at the end of 2022.
Even before the war in Gaza, tens of thousands of Israelis were joining regular demonstrations protesting at a government drive to curb the power of the judiciary that critics saw as an assault on Israeli democracy but which the government said was needed to limit judicial overreach.
On Thursday Yair Golan, a former deputy Chief of Staff in the military who now leads the opposition Democrats party, was pushed to the ground during a scuffle, drawing condemnation and calls for an investigation by other opposition politicians.
Former Defence Minister Benny Gantz noted the clashes were a direct result of divisions caused by “an extremist government that has lost its grip.”
In Tel Aviv, demonstrators rallied outside the Kirya military headquarters complex as ministers met to formally approve the dismissal of Bar.
Since the start of the war, there have also been regular protests by families and supporters of hostages seized by Hamas during its attack on Israel from Gaza on Oct. 7, 2023 that have sometimes echoed the criticisms of the government.
With the resumption of Israel’s campaign in Gaza, the fate of 59 hostages, as many as 24 of whom are still believed to be alive, remains unclear and protesters said a return to war could see them either killed by their captors or accidentally by Israeli bombardments.
“This is not an outcome the Israeli people can accept,” The Hostages and Missing Families Forum, a group representing hostage families, announced in a statement.
