Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses a joint meeting of Congress July 24. Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

By Louis Keene July 24, 2024

Moments into his address to a joint session of Congress Wednesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu paid tribute to Noa Argamani, the freed hostage who had the star’s seat in the gallery next to his wife, Sara. Netanyahu then mentioned the presence of relatives of other hostages, saying: “The pain these families have endured is beyond words.”

By the time he was done speaking, six of those hostage relatives had been forcibly removed from the chamber by the Capitol police. Their offense: Wearing yellow T-shirts that read “SEAL THE DEAL NOW,” and in one case, catcalling Netanyahu as he concluded his remarks.

“The speech was horrendous,” the catcaller, Zahiro Shachar Mor, said in an interview after his release Wednesday night. “It was like directed to 8-year-olds. He didn’t say anything other than hollow slogans.”

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“I felt ashamed for Congress to have to witness this,” added Mor, whose uncle, 79-year-old Avraham Mundar, remains in captivity.

The Capitol police said in an email Wednesday that the protesters were arrested for “unlawful conduct” in the House gallery. Mor said he was told the charge was “obstructing Congress” and is expected to appear in court on Aug, 14 — 12 days after he is scheduled to fly home.

Times of Israel reported that Jewish senators and the American Jewish Committee were among those who intervened to secure their release after about four hours, and that at least 17 hostage relatives attended the speech.  

The arrests reflected a contradiction in Netanyahu’s address: He vows to bring the hostages home, but many of their relatives, Israelis and others around the world see him as a prime obstacle to that result. 

“I came here wanting to hear one sentence: ‘Today I announce that the hostages are coming home,’ and I didn’t hear that once,” Jon Polin, the father of Israeli American hostage Hersh Goldberg-Polin, told NBC News afterward.

As Netanyahu wound up his hourlong address, Mor shouted out, “1,400 dead,” a reference to the original estimate of how many people Hamas murdered on Oct. 7. (The number has since been updated to about 1,200, according to an AFP tally.) Someone in the crowd tried to drown him out by singing Am Yisrael Chai — the nation of Israel lives.

“I couldn’t take it anymore, so I shouted out two words,” Mor said in the interview later. “The attack on 10/7 cost 1,400 Israelis their lives. One of them was my cousin, Roi. You can’t just come here and give a speech as if everything is hunky dory, as if you’re the greatest leader – when on your watch, 1,400 people got killed.” 

“Fourteen hundred is the annual death toll for the American army in Afghanistan,” he continued. “Think about this  – in a single day. And he gets his standing ovation. In Israel, he can’t get out of the streets. He’s embarrassed to be in public, and the U.S. Congress gives him respect and listens to his lies.”

Mor was there representing Kulanu Hatufim — We Are All Hostages — a group that stages recurring anti-Netanyahu protests in Israel. The Capitol police arrested him along with five members of the Hostage and Missing Families Forum, an umbrella group representing the families of approximately 240 hostages who were abducted Oct. 7.

Logan Bayroff, a spokesperson for the We Are All Hostages delegation, said those arrested were Leah Unger, cousin of hostage Omer Shem Tov; Alon Gat and Gal Dickman, brother and cousin of Carmel Gat; Michael Levy, brother of Or Levy; and Carmit Palty Katzir, whose brother Elad Katzir was killed in captivity.

In a blog post prior to the speech, Gat — whose wife, Yarden, was among the hostages released in a November prisoner exchange — said he had turned down Netanyahu’s invitation to fly with him to Washington, saying the Prime Minister was “abandoning Carmel and the 120 hostages who remain in Gaza.”

“I cannot travel alongside the man who can save my sister, but instead, is taking his time at the expense of her life,” he added. 

Mor said that after his catcall, “some ushers came and grabbed me by the hand and escorted me out” of the chamber. Three police officers then “processed me and interrogated me,” he said, reading him his Miranda rights. “The police were fair,” he noted. “I have no grievances for the police.”

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