A prolonged and partially violent confrontation occurred on Monday between bereaved parents and Knesset guards, after the parents were blocked from entering the visitors’ section of the plenum to observe a discussion regarding a state commission of inquiry into the October 7 massacre.
Violent fight between bereaved parents and police officers after they were blocked from entering the Knesset plenum pic.twitter.com/lfAEKKtWEC
— אליאב ברויאר - Eliav Breuer (@BreuerEliav) March 3, 2025
The bereaved parents are members of the NGO October Council, which represents 1,500 families demanding that the government immediately form a commission.
אין גבול לזוועה ולבושה מתמונות אנשי משמר הכנסת הודפים בכוח משפחות שכולות ממחדל השבעה באוקטובר, לחרפה הזו שותף אמיר אוחנה. אין מי שביזה את מוסד יו״ר הכנסת יותר ממנו pic.twitter.com/wXRwefxnrQ
— יאיר לפיד - Yair Lapid (@yairlapid) March 3, 2025
The council said it sent a letter on Sunday to Knesset Speaker Amir Ohana requesting to come to the visitors’ section for the discussion, which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was set to attend.
However, the families were blocked by Knesset guards and police officers at the bottom of a staircase leading to the visitors’ section. The guards said that only a limited number could enter. The confrontation developed into a brawl between officers and bereaved parents. At least two fell down after suffering blows.
The brawl eventually subsided. In an act of protest, the families gathered at the bottom of the staircase and said kaddish, the Jewish prayer of mourning, while holding up placards with pictures of their loved ones.
The families were eventually allowed into the visitors’ section under heavy guard. At one point during the prime minister’s speech, the family members stood up and turned their backs to the prime minister while holding up their loved ones’ pictures. Ohana directed the guards to remove them, but eventually reneged on his order.
The October Council held a press conference earlier, calling on the government to form a state commission of inquiry.
Bereaved parents and family members spoke
Rafi Ben Sheetreet, father of Sgt. Elroi Ben Sheetreet, who was killed in the Nahal Oz military base, emphasized that the demand is not a matter of political bickering and that the families have no interest in a political investigation.
He said the demand for a state commission of inquiry was intended to reveal the complete and full truth without bias and without favoritism. He also noted that those who say they have no faith in the judicial system are working to undermine the foundations and pillars on which Israeli society and the only democracy in the Middle East are based.
“A statement like ‘we have no faith in the judicial system’ is nothing but a poor and flimsy excuse that has no basis and no proven substantial content,” Ben Sheetreet said. “The purpose of those who claim this is to evade responsibility, obscure, cover up, and smear.”
Eyal Eshel, father of slain IDF field observer Roni Eshel, spoke in favor of launching the probe.
“October 7 could have been prevented,” Eshel said. “For months, I’ve been shouting that we must investigate, the shredders are running... the information is disappearing... In what world do I myself have to investigate why they didn’t come to save my eldest daughter, who was burned to death?”
Another speaker was Rachel Goldberg-Polin, the mother of Hersh, who was killed in captivity in a tunnel in Rafah, along with five other hostages. Goldberg-Polin, a US native, spoke in English.
“My name is Rachel, and I am the mother of Hersh Goldberg-Polin, a 23-year-old American citizen and Israeli civilian who was attending the Nova festival. He was kidnapped on October 7 from a bomb shelter after having his left dominant arm blown off. Hersh was held in Gaza, tortured, starved and executed with five other young beautiful people, after surviving 328 days there.”
Goldberg-Polin continued, “Twenty-four years ago, on September 11, 2001, we were living in California, where Hersh was born, and we awoke to the World Trade Center towers imploding in New York, and south of Washington DC, the Pentagon was on fire. In 2002, president George W. Bush signed into legislation the founding of the 9/11 Commission, which was an independent, bipartisan panel, created by both Republicans and Democrats, to investigate the worst terrorist attack in American history.
“Its mandate was both to lay out the facts that led to the September 11 terrorist attacks and to prevent future attacks. The commission led to major changes in the US government to fix vulnerabilities in the system and published a clear, widely accessible final report laying out what had gone so badly wrong.
“Not only did president Bush sit for interviews with the commission, so did vice president Dick Cheney as well as the executive team that preceded them, president Bill Clinton and vice president Al Gore. When it was completed, president Bush declassified the final report and let the American people see it in full.
“I, along with a staggering 83% of the population of the State of Israel, call upon our decision makers to establish a state commission of inquiry, to do what all aspiring democracies do, even in times of extreme crisis and soul-searching: listen to the vast majority of the people. Seek answers to hard questions in order for our resilient nation to stagger forward toward the light. The light that only clarity can provide,” she said.