Protester tells Eisenkot 'you murdered your son' outside his Herzliya home

A small group of demonstrators gathered outside the Herzliya home of Gadi Eisenkot, chairman of the Yashar party, and one of them used a megaphone to accuse him of having murdered his son, who was killed fighting in the Gaza Strip. Ynet reported that the protesters were Netanyahu supporters, that only a handful of people took part, and that the protest took place the night before its report, against the backdrop of what it described as a Likud campaign to delegitimise the election results.

According to The Times of Israel, footage shows the man shouting "You murdered your son" and calling Eisenkot a traitor. The same report says the protester also turned on Eisenkot's wife, Hannah, insulting and threatening her; in the footage he told her: "You will be next to your son." The Times of Israel described the gathering as a protest against the possible formation of a Jewish-Arab government.

Who Gadi Eisenkot is

Eisenkot is a former chief of staff of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), the country's military, and now leads Yashar, a party in opposition to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government. His home is in Herzliya, a city on the Mediterranean coast north of Tel Aviv.

The slogan shouted at the protest referred to his son, Master Sergeant (reserves) Gal Eisenkot. According to The Times of Israel, he fell in combat in Gaza in December 2023. The "reserves" designation means he was serving as a reservist, a civilian called up for military duty, rather than as a conscript or career soldier.

How Eisenkot and his party responded

Yashar issued a statement condemning the protest. The party blamed what it called "rotten, unrestrained political leadership" and, in the account given by The Times of Israel, said that leadership had abandoned all limits in order to hold on to power. The party also said the episode illustrated "what losing one's way looks like." A Ynet news alert summarised the party's reaction as describing a leadership that was rotten and without restraint.

Eisenkot himself commented on the overnight protest. In remarks circulated by journalist Amit Segal, he called it further proof of what he described as an immediate duty to replace Netanyahu's government as soon as possible, for the sake of the State of Israel and of Israeli society.

Yair Golan's reaction

Yair Golan, another opposition figure, also responded. Ynet reported that Golan was due to meet with Liberman, and quoted him as saying: "This is the poison that Netanyahu and his people spread." The report did not give details of the planned meeting or what it concerned.

The political backdrop

The protest came during a tense period following Israel's election. The Jerusalem Post covered the incident within its reporting on the election and described the demonstrators as right-wing protesters targeting Eisenkot at his home. The framings in the reports are distinct: Ynet linked the protest to the Likud, Netanyahu's party, and its challenge to the legitimacy of the results, while The Times of Israel tied it to opposition to a potential government that would include both Jewish and Arab parties. The reports do not contradict each other on this point, but each emphasises a different grievance.

What the reports do not say

The reports differ on the date. A photograph caption carried by The Times of Israel dates the protest to November 1, 2026, while a caption in The Jerusalem Post describes it as taking place on the night of November 2, 2026. Ynet says only that it happened the previous night.

None of the reports identifies the man with the megaphone or gives an exact number of demonstrators beyond Ynet's description of a handful of people. None says whether police were present, whether anyone was detained, or whether a complaint was filed over the threats directed at Hannah Eisenkot. The reports also do not record any response from Netanyahu or from the Likud to the protest or to the accusations made by Yashar and by Golan.