Many museums across Israel have closed today as most municipalities join the nationwide labour strike called by the Histadrut, the country’s main labour union.
The call to strike action was made on Sunday evening in an effort to put pressure on the government to reach a ceasefire deal with Hamas after six hostages were found dead in Gaza.
The Israel Defense Force said the bodies of the civilians Ori Danino, Carmel Gat, Alexander Lobanov, Almog Sarusi, Eden Yerushalmi and Hersh Goldberg-Polin were recovered on Saturday from tunnels in Rafah. “According to our initial estimation, they were brutally murdered by Hamas terrorists a short time before we reached them,” an Israeli military spokesperson, R Adm Daniel Hagari, told the Guardian.
At least three of the hostages were reportedly due to be released in the first phase of a ceasefire proposal drafted in July. On Sunday night, thousands of protestors took to the streets in grief and anger, with some 300,000 participants reported in Tel Aviv.
This morning, museums across the country announced they would remain closed to the public. The chair of Icom Israel, Raz Samira, tells The Art Newspaper that smaller museums, including the Umm el-Fahem Art Gallery, the country’s first Arab Museum run by the artist Sayid Abu Shaqra, have also joined the strike.
The Israel Museum in Jerusalem wrote on its website: “As an expression of solidarity with those whose loved ones have been taken hostage and our sorrow at the cruel murder of captives, the Israel Museum will be closed today Monday, September 2.” Others, like the Mishkan Museum of Art in Ein Harod, which is closed for installation, called on its followers to join the anti-government protests and demand the government strikes a ceasefire deal and return the hostages.
On Sunday, the Tel Aviv Museum of Art responded to the news with a sound work, which it projected from its façade at 3pm. The work by the late artist Moshe Gershuni, titled Dedicated Hand (1976), is a multi-part, politically charged piece that also includes a recording of the artist singing a Hebrew poem by Zalman Shneour.
The Museum’s chief executive officer, Tania Coen-Uzzielli, tells The Art Newspaper: “The Tel Aviv Museum of Art decided to act by playing the work and shutting down the museum as soon as the devastating news was received, before the municipality’s and the Labour Union’s decision to call for a general strike. The museum, located in the heart of Tel Aviv, is a responsive and socially engaged institution, an institution committed first and foremost to freedom of expression, equal rights, education and culture for the community. In recent years, it has taken an active and significant part in the protest against the judicial reform and has been cooperating with the headquarters of the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, and the Hostage Square [the temporarily renamed plaza in front of the museum] has already become a part of the museum.”
