Police were forced to back down from a proposed ban on displaying images of children killed in Gaza at a Tel Aviv protest last month.
Opposition to Israel's attack on Gaza is growing, but the conflict continues.
Thousands of reservists from all branches of the Israeli military have signed letters in recent weeks urging Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's administration to halt the combat and focus instead on negotiating the return of the remaining 59 hostages held by Hamas.
Few Israelis questioned the war's rationale eighteen months ago: to defeat Hamas and get the captives back.
The ceasefire in January and the subsequent release of over 30 hostages gave many people hope that the war would soon come to an end.
However, such aspirations were shattered in mid-March when Israel violated the ceasefire and went back to combat.
Former Mossad espionage chief Danny Yatom told me, "We came to the conclusion that Israel is going to a very bad place."
"We are aware that Netanyahu is primarily troubled by his personal interests. Furthermore, his interests and the stability of the government come first on the list of considerations, not the hostages.
Like Yatom, many of the people who have recently signed letters have long been the prime minister's detractors. Some participated in the anti-government demonstrations that took place before the conflict that broke out on October 7, 2023, after Hamas attacked Israel.
However, Yatom claims that's not the reason he chose to speak up.
He stated, "I signed my name and I am taking part in the demonstrations for a national motive, not a political one.
"I am highly concerned that my country is going to lose its way."
In early April, 1,000 air force retirees and reservists signed the first open letter to be published.
"The continuation of the war does not contribute to any of its declared goals," they stated "and will lead to the death of the hostages" .
Before time ran out on the estimated 24 hostages still believed to be alive in Gaza, the signatories begged Israel to follow their example.
"They are putting their lives at greater peril every day. Every indecision is a great embarrassment.
Similar letters have since been sent by other decorated commanders and nearly every branch of the military, including elite fighting and intelligence units.
Over 12,000 signatures in total.
Hundreds of thousands of Israeli reservists eagerly responded to the summons after October 7.
However, a growing number are declining; according to sources, reserve attendance may have fallen as low as 50–60%.
It is an impending crisis of a magnitude not seen since Israel's first war in Lebanon in 1982, for a military that mostly relies on reservists to fight its conflicts.
I met "Yoav" (not his real name), an infantry reservist who requested anonymity, in a green park in Jerusalem.
Last summer, Yoav served in Gaza, but he vowed never to return.
"I had the feeling that I needed to go to help my brothers and sisters," he stated to me.
"I thought I was making a positive impact. Good but complicated. However, my perspective on it has changed.
Yoav claimed that the government's resolve to continue battling Hamas while hostages in Gaza's tunnels face certain death was misguided.
"We are very strong and we can beat Hamas, but it's not about beating Hamas," he stated. "It's about losing our country."
Yoav told me that he made an effort to be "the best moral soldier that a man can be" while he was in Gaza.
However, detractors argue that the longer the conflict lasts, the more difficult it will be for Israel to assert—as government representatives frequently do—that her army is the most moral army in the world.
The former general Amiram Levin recently wrote a column in the left-of-center newspaper Haaretz suggesting that it was time for soldiers, beginning with senior commanders, to consider defying orders.
"The risk of being dragged into war crimes and suffering a fatal blow to the Israel Defense Forces and our social ethos," he stated, "make it impossible to stand idly by" .
Such borders have already been crossed, according to some of Israel's detractors, including those who have filed charges before the International Criminal Court and International Court of Justice.
Accusing the demonstrators of spreading "propaganda lies" by "a small handful of fringe elements – loud, anarchist, and disconnected pensioners, most of whom haven't served in years," Netanyahu has retaliated against them.
However, according to polls, the complaint letters show a growing public belief that the release of the remaining hostages should come first.
Images of the captives are held in the air while other demonstrators sit on the road with pictures of Palestinian children slain in the conflict in Tel Aviv, where raucous anti-war protests have been going on for well over a year.
Such emotional outbursts seem to have shook the authorities amid the commotion caused by the letters.
Protesters holding posters with the words "genocide" or "ethnic cleansing" and "pictures of children or babies from Gaza" were briefly informed by the police on April 20 that such images would not be allowed.
The police swiftly retreated after the organizers expressed their outrage.
The prime minister, however, keeps saying that he is committed to defeating Hamas.
Netanyahu maintains that the only way to return the captives is through military pressure.
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