About a hundred high school students are protesting at Tel Aviv's Hostage Square on Monday as students across the country are striking over the government's failure to advance a hostage release deal.
"Two years, this is no longer just a tragedy, this is no longer a terrible event. This is routine. And routine is the most terrible thing, because routine means indifference. And indifference is the end," student Naomi Or Afek said at the square. "I am not willing to live in such a routine, and I am not willing for my children to grow up into it and for many more like me, and therefore today we are stopping - not coming to schools and showing that we are not willing to take part in the 'kidnapped routine,' she added.
Twelfth-grade student Hanoch Cohen said: "The Minister of Education asked that all students come today, on the first day of the school year, with white shirts because it is festive. And I ask, what is festive? For almost two years now, every celebration has been incomplete. As a society whose central values are solidarity, we have nothing to celebrate. We decided to strike to demonstrate solidarity with the hostages simply because they were Israelis – like us. The same solidarity that will soon allow us to dedicate the best years of our lives to the state."
