Thousands Rally Across Israel Demanding Return of Ran Gvili's Body Before Gaza Ceasefire's Second Phase

On Saturday night, crowds gathered in four Israeli places at once: Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Haifa and the southern town of Meitar. They came with different grievances against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government, but one demand ran through the evening: return the remains of Israel Police Master Sgt. Ran Gvili, the last hostage still held in Gaza.

The clearest expression of it came in Meitar, Gvili's hometown. A crowd gathered there to hear former hostages and their relatives, while the family continues its campaign to bring his body home. That campaign is now more than three months old, counted from the start of a ceasefire deal that required Hamas to free all the captives. Speakers included Gvili's mother, Talik, former hostage Eitan Horn, and Dani Miran, whose son Omri was released.

Miran addressed US President Donald Trump directly. He said he would not accept moving to the second phase of the Gaza ceasefire without Ran's return, and he proposed a large demonstration in front of the US embassy building the following week. The families' struggle, he said, will not end until Gvili's body is back in Israel.

Talik Gvili spoke to Steve Witkoff, Trump's Middle East envoy. "Deals need to be fulfilled," she said. She argued that not every effort had been made to bring Rani home, and she voiced fear about the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt, which is due to reopen next week despite Israeli objections. The second phase, she said, cannot go ahead without her son.

Before the rally, the family issued a statement saying the pressure was aimed at the wrong party. They noted that Trump said in Davos this week that Hamas knows where their son is. In their words, Israel is being pushed to keep meeting its side of the agreement while Hamas deceives the world and refuses to return the last abducted person, as the agreement it signed requires. They called on Netanyahu to tell the American envoys that if they want regional peace and the reconstruction of Gaza, efforts must be made to return their son.

Elsewhere the protests were broader. In Tel Aviv's Habima Square, a crowd in the hundreds carried banners and flags on a mix of issues: government attempts to weaken the High Court of Justice, the wave of crime in Israel's Arab society, and the case of Haymanut Kasau, a missing Ethiopian Israeli child. Haaretz, citing witnesses, reported that right-wing counter-protesters confronted the crowd and that one shoved an apparently elderly man to the ground. The paper also reported that police detained one person as protesters blocked a road.

In Jerusalem, demonstrators gathered near Netanyahu's residence, with a similar range of causes. Yanal Jabarin of the coexistence organization Abraham Initiatives spoke about crime in Arab communities, calling it the result of years of neglect, discrimination and deliberate government policy. When citizens live in fear without security, enforcement or justice, he said, the whole democracy is endangered.

In Haifa, Haifa University professor Israel Waismel-Manor told the crowd that Netanyahu knows how to sow only hatred and fear, and that the country was built on a dream instead.

What to watch now is whether Washington presses Hamas over Gvili's remains, and whether the Rafah crossing reopens next week as planned over Israel's objections.