Medical personnel protest excessive police violence against demonstrators

Medical personnel gathered in protest outside Sheba Medical Center in Tel Hashomer on Wednesday morning, as scientists from the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot held a strike against police violence at protests, especially against medical teams.

The protest and strike followed recent incidents in which protesters were hurt.

Police used “disproportionate violence alongside illegal use of means to disperse protests,” protest organization Change Generation said in a statement. Police shot water cannons directly at protesters, causing some to lose consciousness and sending others to emergency rooms, it said.

Dr. Tal Weissbach was injured at a protest in Jerusalem earlier this week after the spray from a water cannon hit her in the eye, even though she was clearly identifiable as a medical professional.

“It’s interesting that specifically I, with the bright orange [vest] with ‘doctor’ on the back, got a direct spray,” Weissbach said in a video released by protest organization Yalla Tikva.

“Is [National Security Minister Itamar] Ben-Gvir ordering [police] to harm medical professionals specifically?” she asked.

In response, the Israel Police said it takes seriously the “disruption of public order and violent riot that occurred on Aza Street,” which included setting fires on the road, physical altercations with officers, and attacking officers, as well as trying to pass police barricades.

Violent incidents

All of this occurred after police “allowed the freedom of protest and the coordinated parade for hours, as well as securing them,” the police said. “As far as there are claims against those police who acted [at the protest], they should be referred to the bodies that are authorized to handle them, as usual.”

The incident followed another one in which a doctor was dragged violently by police while providing medical treatment to a protester, said medical professional protest organization the Whitecoats.

Organizers also accused the police of violence when removing protesters blocking the exit from Jerusalem on Tuesday. Protest organization Change Direction blocked the road with protesters who climbed ladders held aloft by other protesters with ropes.

Footage of police clearing the protest appears to show police knocking the ladder to the road and one officer hitting a protester in the head with his fist repeatedly.

One of the protesters on the ladder knocked to the ground was taken to a hospital emergency room.

“This is what a police [force] that is losing its way looks like,” said Change Direction on X, sharing a video in which police appear to pull the ladder out from under the protester. “They are willing to risk the life of a protester to clear a road.”

“We did not believe that the police would be willing to knock a protester down from a height of three meters,” it said. “They could have easily taken her down safely, but chose the violent way.”

In response, the police said dozens of protesters had disturbed public order and endangered themselves by climbing ladders while blocking the main access road to Shaare Zedek Medical Center and a main artery out of the city.

“When forces arrived, an order was given to them to disperse by the police commander on site,” the police said. “After they did not heed this, police began pushing those disturbing the public order toward the sidewalk to try to open the road.”

Protest organizations cited additional incidents this week in which protesters were harmed by the police or prevented from receiving medical treatment. The Whitecoat organization said a man’s leg was broken after a water cannon stream threw him into a wall.

Many of the incidents occurred this week during what protest organizations are calling an escalation of actions taken by them to bring back the hostages or to replace the government.

On Monday and Tuesday, there were large rallies at the Knesset. The rally on Monday was attended by an estimated 150,000 people, according to protest organizers. There were also protests and strikes held at high schools throughout the country, and protests are scheduled to take place in the North and South. Protest convoys are also scheduled for this week, the protest organizers said.

Israel Police Insp.-Gen. Kobi Shabtai on Wednesday addressed the public’s confidence in and the role of the police, as well as accusations of the politicization of police, at a conference at Tel Aviv University.

“When a police officer exercises authority toward a citizen, he must see the law, and only the law, before his eyes,” he said. “The citizen must know that the policeman standing in front of him represents the law only and is certainly not acting on behalf of one minister or another.”

“The police in a democratic country must be free, with absolutely no politics,” Shabtai said. “It must remain autonomous – free of any political bias, one way or another. This is the only way to guarantee police independence.”

“The clear boundaries between the political echelon and the enforcing entity are cracking, and I fear what might happen if they are completely erased,” he said. “The only way to avoid this is to maintain the clear separation between the political echelon and the law-enforcing entity.”

“During my tenure as police commissioner, I worked under three ministers,” Shabtai said. “Naturally, every minister has a different professional outlook. Unfortunately, especially in the past year, the current minister’s attempts to blatantly violate the required balance have been multiplying. There are many examples of this. Don’t make the mistake of regarding the last event as an issue that has only come up in the last month.”