Clashes between police officers and protesters, Yom Kippur fighters, outside the Prime Minister's House in Caesarea/Photo: Moked Caesarea
On Saturday night in Caesarea, when there was concern that the State of Israel was under an existential threat from a missile attack from Iran, with the feeling of the eve of a world war being excited about it and in a kind of scene from a surreal play, about a thousand Israelis once again wrestled with Israeli police officers near the tomb of the Netanyahu family. The demonstrations have been going on for years, but this time it was an extreme case. If God forbid an apocalyptic war had started that night, and assuming we would have survived it to tell, this could have been the opening scene for a movie about it.
Normative citizens and more than that, the salt of the land, stood there with megaphones, drums and whistles, a group borrowed from the Haifa protest danced in pink and everyone called for the removal of the commander-in-chief entrusted at that very moment with protecting them from a catastrophic event. In front of them were police officers from the Hadera station, the Menashe region and the Coastal district, reinforced by the Security Forces, exhausted from another challenging week, who would have preferred to spend this evening at home, in the bosom of their families who are anxious about the Iranian threat, but equally imbued with a sense of mission not to let this event "get out of control" .
There was a disproportionate police response this week even before the weekly demonstration, when the commander of the Hadera station and the commander of YSM Menashe appeared in the yard of a private house on Egor St., where they violently arrested three 70-plus year old Kippur fighters, in an incident that started because of a light truck parked in the house's parking lot with a "tank" on it Made of styrofoam, when the police say that such a "tank" scares the neighbors.
"The minds and the demonstrators are behaving in such an extreme way that it is dangerous," the police claimed in court this week. A total of 15 people were arrested that evening, including the three Kippur fighters at the station, and were released early in the morning. With the exception of Brigadier General (resp.) Amir Hashakal, who refused to sign the conditions, he was brought to a court that determined that his arrest was only intended to humiliate him and released him while recommending that the protesters start suing the police for the false arrests. The police, who believe that something is "wrong" with the Magistrate's Court in Hadera and are convinced that Judge Ehud Kaplan is biased in favor of the Kaplan protesters, and this in gentle terms, appealed to the District Court in Haifa where the police suffered another blow to this thesis, when Judge Lubna Sha'ata-Halaila rejected the appeal.
In general, the vast majority of arrests end with release at the station. Those who are brought to court are released by the judges and recently while complaining at the Hadera station. The prosecutor's office did not file a single indictment against anyone who was arrested during the demonstrations against the prime minister in Caesarea. Even the police did not know how to point to such an indictment against a protester.
"The police officers today are on the edge in terms of their work, in terms of the load they have, in terms of the pressure they are under, they have no rest, they close for hours and hours, they know they are finishing something and it is not certain that they will go home," explains Sub-Superintendent (retired) Benny Abeliya , former commander of an area in the coastal district of the police. "The atmosphere of war also hovers over their heads and let's not forget that this is an organization that lost 61 of its people on October 7. The police do not distinguish between leftists and rightists. Among the policemen I know, there are those who support the right side and there are many who support the left and I have not seen a difference in the way they operate Towards one side or another. At the moment most of the demonstrations are coming from the left against the right and I am sure that if tomorrow or the day after tomorrow the right makes a demonstration that goes out of proportion, then the police's reaction will be the same."
"We are not against the police"
The police declined to be interviewed for this article. Not to give background talk either. But, from conversations with quite a few police officers in the last few months, the impression was created that a lot of loathing has developed in the ranks of the police towards the demonstrators in Caesarea. Some officers believe that these protesters are traitors, a feeling that has intensified since the events of October 7. that they are simply interfering with the police in their many tasks at this time, including preventing Arab disturbances due to the war, dealing with the ongoing murderous crime in Arab society with an emphasis on the coastal district that treated three bodies in two unrelated murders last Saturday night, the eve of the demonstration in question, being on alert for a situation where they will be required to reach the sites where enemy missiles fell, etc.
"We are in the middle of a war, which is creating many challenges in the home front, and even more so on the northern border, which is commanded by Mr. Daniel Levy," the attorney's office said this week on behalf of the commander of the Hoof District, Superintendent Danny Levy, when a court hearing was required in Tel Aviv Levy, along with the commander of the Menashe area, and the commander of the Hadera station, deputy commander Amit Polak, have difficulty hiding their political leanings. The loyalty to the minister's policy that buys them points within the organization leads to a loss of trust in them On the ground among the demonstrators. The protesters of "Moked" Caesarea, the group organizing the demonstrations, say out loud that the Hadera police have become a political police and that the abuse of protesters in Caesarea is unusual. In court this week, Judge Ehud Kaplan ruled that the arrest of Lt. Col. Amir The wit in this demonstration is intended "just to humiliate him".
George Bernard Shaw once called America and England: "two nations separated by a common language". Paraphrasing this and looking at it, it can be said that the policemen who stood in front of the demonstrators in Caesarea are two camps separated by a common flag. The demonstrators do not dispute that the police officers in front of them are Zionist-patriotic Israelis. If there is criticism, it is because they took it too far, or they misinterpret what patriotism is. This disparity between these Israelis and these Israelis was manifested in the Motzach by the fact that senior Israeli police officers on active duty were recorded throwing senior retired Israel Defense Forces officers to the ground and into a car, as if they were sacks of potatoes. The demonstration began with a speech by former MK, Attorney Gabi Leski, from the
"
arresting system", which was dedicated to instructing the police on the maximum punishments expected for those who will undergo crimes of false imprisonment, abuse of authority, and more As a response to the "guidance" leaflets without a logo or signature that the police handed out to the protesters as a "see-you-have-been-warned" threat, the police, the ones who listened last night, bit their lips when Lasky pointed things out to them.
Crowded in Caesarea. Everyone knows everyone. There isn't a police officer who doesn't know Dr. Yolanda Yavor, who insists on appearing at unexpected hours with a megaphone in front of the Prime Minister's house and has been arrested seven times since December, twice spending the night behind bars. On the other hand, there isn't a regular protester who doesn't know the police officers in charge. As Leski finished her speech, the demonstrators passionately and defiantly chanted to the commander of the area, Ntsm Ben Shoshan: "Shlomi-la-thai-mmz". His own. Ben Shushan turned his shoulder and cut off contact.
A few weeks ago the commander of the Coastal District, Superintendent Danny Levy, was on call. "Most police officers do their job faithfully and professionally. They know how to contain what is happening around them. Superintendent Daniel Levy is unfortunately not one of them," claimed Gilad Reichenbaum, a documentary photographer documenting the protests and who, during a demonstration about a month ago, documented severe violence by police forces against a protester. "I spontaneously yelled at the attacking officer, 'What are you doing to him?'" Reichenbaum shared. "So, Levy aggressively grabbed me by the back of the neck and threatened to arrest me. I told him he worked for Ben Gvir, and then he told me I was right, and physically attacked me."
Following the tank incident, Lt. Sergeant Polk made headlines. "There is no doubt that there is a desire to please Ben Gabir, but in Haifa we are treated professionally by the police. What is happening in Caesarea is completely different from other places. The Hadera police are more aggressive, more violent, make more arrests and we are seeing the results," says Gali Eshet Bezeq, one of the organizers of the protest in Haifa who participated in some of the demonstrations also near the Prime Minister's house in Caesarea.
"Protesters sometimes also come charged, but the main avenue of the protest is not against the police," says Nadav Galon, the protest's spokesman. "We appreciate the policemen, we know that they are there first of all to protect us and allow the freedom of protest and we appreciate the fact that on October 7th and since then policemen have been busy thwarting such and such events."
However, Galon emphasizes that "we are warning against the damage to democracy and the attempt to use governmental power or war to make Israel a less liberal and less democratic place. It is impossible to ignore the 'ben gavirization' that pervaded the police and the conduct of the police officers at the Caesarea police station, which includes the lack of inclusion and abuse of protesters is The most obvious example of this process. We are almost two hundred days into the war. Whoever is at the head of Hamas and is responsible for the disaster on October 7th, so we expect the public not to come to his house once a week?"
The police said in response: "The Israel Police operates impartially and allows freedom of expression and protest as a legitimate right in a democratic country, but will not allow disturbances of any kind or damage to freedom of movement and any behavior that may endanger the safety of the public."