Hundreds of residents from the northern border city of Kiryat Shmona protested on Sunday outside the Prime Minister’s Office and the United States embassy in Jerusalem against the ceasefire with Hezbollah, which was reached on Thursday after weeks of relentless rocket and drone attacks against communities in northern Israel.
The protest was organized as part of a larger strike orchestrated by the Kiryat Shmona municipality in response to the 10-day ceasefire, which halted Israel’s offensive against the Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon and which critics have charged was imposed on Israel by Washington, against the country’s best interests.
The municipality said all non-essential services would be suspended on Sunday, and the city’s education system was shuttered, with the exception of special education infrastructure.
The city has been targeted the most by Hezbollah in both the recent round of violence and the year of hostilities in 2023-2024, prompting a large share of residents to evacuate.
“Our demands are unequivocal,” the municipality said in its announcement. “Dismantling Hezbollah as a military and civilian organization, ensuring effective defensive lines and defense systems on the northern border, and full protection for every resident and public institution, particularly educational institutions.”
The decision to close the schools prompted anger from Education Minister Yoav Kisch, who said they should be left out of the protest action.
“I am not making any claims about the mayor’s political protest,” Kisch told Army Radio. “It is a big mistake to involve the education system in any strike. Harming children and taking the education system hostage for any purpose is a big mistake.”
Not content to keep the demonstration contained within the city’s limits, a convoy of vehicles departed Kiryat Shmona for Jerusalem on Sunday morning to bring their demands to the decision-makers.
“After two years of being evacuated with our children growing up in hotels and shelters, we will not lend a hand to an agreement that means abandoning the north and allowing Hezbollah to continue arming itself on our fence,” the city’s municipality said, calling residents to join the protest in the Israeli capital.
‘Why are you letting our children live like this?’
Protesters were joined by Kiryat Shmona Mayor Avichai Stern, who, despite being a member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party, has been an outspoken critic of the government’s actions in northern Israel since the previous bout of fighting with Hezbollah erupted in October 2023, forcing the evacuation of his city.
Prior to October 2023, roughly 24,500 people called Kiryat Shmona home. But over a year of fighting with Hezbollah and the resulting evacuation took its toll, and, as of September 2025, the population of Kiryat Shmona had dropped to 18,600.
Standing with his constituents outside the US embassy, Stern addressed his remarks to US President Donald Trump, who imposed the ceasefire on Israel and publicly declared that Jerusalem was “prohibited” from carrying out any more strikes in Lebanon.
“President Trump, you wouldn’t let your kids live under threat. Why are you letting our children live like this?” Stern implored, before turning his attention to Netanyahu and the governments of Israel, past and present.
“You have been abandoning us since 1969,” he declared, apparently referring to a deadly Katyusha rocket attack on the city on January 1 of that year. “You have done nothing to protect the residents of Kiryat Shmona.”
“There are plenty of plans,” he said, listing off various commitments from the government to secure, invest in, and bring industry to the northernmost communities in Israel.
“A train, transportation, health services,” Stern reeled off. “We have been begging for a hospital. Why is a child in Kiryat Shmona not equal to a child in the center or the south?”
ראש עיריית קריית שמונה ותושבי העיר הגיעו לירושלים וקראו לממשלה: “הבטחתם לנו ניצחון, רוצים שקט לדורות ולא סבב אחרי סבב” (12)
המבזק החברתי: https://t.co/d0wiNOaA3s pic.twitter.com/JbpCbpessz
— המבזק החברתי (@mivzakhevrati) April 19, 2026
The protest garnered the support of members of the opposition, who, since the ceasefire was announced on Thursday, have berated Netanyahu for capitulating to the US.
Yair Golan, chair of the left-wing The Democrats party, told Army Radio that he understood why residents of the city are angry.
“They are absolutely right. What is happening is simply a disgrace. This city is empty; 40 percent of its residents have left and will probably not return. This city is not receiving the proper government support to recover,” he said.
Amid the anger, a return to normal life
Still, despite anger from residents and municipal officials, an air of normalcy began to return to northern Israel as the shaky truce appeared to hold.
The Health Ministry said on Sunday that it had directed all hospitals in the north to resume aboveground operations, in accordance with IDF Home Front Command instructions and an up-to-date security assessment.
If the ceasefire falls apart, however, the ministry said the hospitals remained ready to return to underground operations within a few hours.
Prof. Masad Barhoum, CEO of Galilee Medical Center in Nahariya, praised hospital staff, telling them that after 50 days of operating in protected underground areas, their “preparedness, resilience, and performance under relentless fire and fear along the front line are exemplary.”
The hospital remained vigilant, he said, “as our preparedness may be tested again.”
Since the start of the ceasefire on Thursday, two Israeli soldiers were killed in southern Lebanon, bringing the number of soldiers killed since fighting renewed on March 2 to 15.
Two civilians were also killed by Hezbollah rockets, and an Israeli civilian was mistakenly killed in the north by Israeli artillery shelling.
