“We hope that the government has made as much effort to bring back the hostages as it has to end the strike” – Libération

Peter Lerner of the Israeli Histadrut trade union, which organized the general strike, said the discovery of the six dead on Sunday was a sign that “things needed to be shaken up” to give priority to the hostages.

For the director of the international department of the Histadrut trade union center, Peter Lerner, who was the spokesman for the IDF for the first six months of the war – and also a reserve lieutenant colonel – the discovery on Sunday of the six Israeli hostages executed by Hamas was the straw that broke the camel’s back. And pushed the unions into the streets.

Why did you wait so long to call for a general strike? Why now? The war has been going on for almost a year. What has changed?

The Histadrut, as the representative of all workers in Israel, of members of the entire political spectrum, has supported the families throughout the last eleven months, in various ways, including accompanying the Families Forum. We marched with them to Jerusalem. A lot has been done and we maintain ongoing relations with the families. And we have always warned that if we see that politics becomes a priority over people, over hostages, then there will be a call to action. What we have seen in recent days, and especially on Sunday, when the six hostages were executed by Hamas, in a reality where for weeks we have been talking about the parameters of an agreement, has