‘You murdered my grandson’: Israeli pilot heckles minister

Former Israeli air force commander Assaf Agmon disrupted the annual Israel Prize Ceremony in Jerusalem on Thursday to protest the current government.

Accusing the government of abandoning the 59 captives still in Gaza and sending soldiers “to die in vain”, he also blamed them for the death of his grandson, Gur Kehati, a soldier killed in Lebanon while providing a military escort to a settler seeking “archaeological evidence” of a historical Jewish presence there.

The incident became a political scandal in Israel at the time, with many questioning why an archaeologist was allowed access to a foreign combat zone during a war. The move was criticised as putting soldiers’ lives at risk in order to develop arguments for the settlement of areas of Lebanon.

Agmon is one of many Israelis increasingly frustrated with the way in which Israel’s government is prosecuting the war, especially after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday that freeing the remaining captives is not Israel’s “supreme goal” in its war on Gaza.

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