Over 700,000 people have participated in protests across Israel, demanding a ceasefire and a hostage deal, with approximately 550,000 individuals gathering in Tel Aviv alone, as reported by the Hostages and Missing Families Forum on Sunday.
The streets of Tel Aviv were flooded with hundreds of thousands of protesters on Sunday following the Israeli military's announcement of recovering the bodies of six hostages killed by Hamas in Gaza. Organizers of the protests described the crowd in Tel Aviv as an 'endless sea of protesters,' marking it as the largest demonstration in the city since the war began on October 7.
Initially, protest organizers estimated the crowd size in Tel Aviv to be around 300,000. Independent verification of the figures is pending, with Israeli police being requested to provide an official estimation of the crowd size.
Witnesses observed large crowds near the Israel Defense Forces headquarters in Tel Aviv, where many demonstrators were seen waving Israeli flags and holding posters depicting the hostages held in Gaza. The protesters voiced their demands for a ceasefire and a resolution to the hostage situation.
Chants of 'we won't abandon them' resonated through the crowds, with the names of the six hostages whose bodies were recovered by the Israeli military on Saturday being repeated fervently.
