The family of fallen IDF Lt. Hadar Goldin slammed the leaders of the newly formed Blue and White party for failing to return their deceased son's body from terrorist forces.
"All the generals who want to be leaders need to explain to us before they are elected, why they failed and what they are going to do to correct their mistakes, " Prof. Simcha Goldin, the soldier's father stated at a protest near where the 23-year-old Givati commando was killed.
He called the statements of former IDF chief of staff Benny Gantz, who is heading the Blue and White party, "empty slogans," adding "whoever sweeps the Goldin family under the rug sweeps all IDF soldiers under the rug."
Hundreds took part in the weekly vigil in memory of Goldin, including MK Haim Yellin of Labor and MK Moti Yogev of Bayit Yehudi, held near Israel's southern border with Gaza.
Goldin and fellow IDF soldier Oron Shaul were killed during Operation Protective Edge in 2014 hours after a cease-fire was reached between Gaza's Hamas ruled government and Israel. Their bodies were taken via underground tunnels back to Hamas-controlled territory where they have been held ever since.
Late Thursday night Gabi Ashkenazi and Moshe Yaalon, both also former IDF top generals, joined Gantz in his newly formed Blue and White party ahead of the April 9 elections.
Lashing out at what he perceived as abandonment by the upper echelons of the government and army, Prof. Goldin stated, "a government that can not bring back soldiers after four and a half years is incapable of anything."
Two other Israeli civilians are also being held in Gaza and presumed alive -- Avera Mengistu, an Israeli of Jewish-Ethiopian heritage, and Hisham al-Sayed, a Bedouin-Israeli.