Angry protesters unleashed fireworks and obstructed the Ayalon Highway with barricades as they condemned the refusal by Netanyahu to sign any truce and prisoner swap deal despite months of mediation efforts by Egypt, Qatar, and the US.

The Israeli Channel 13 estimated that more than 350,000 took part in the protests which are the largest against the government since the start of the Israeli war in Gaza 11 months ago.

Israel police made several arrests.

The protests on Sunday evening came in response to a call from Arnon Bar-David, the chairman of Israel's powerful Histadrut trade union, who announced earlier on Sunday a "complete strike" in support of Gaza captives on Monday and urged a deal to secure their release after six more were announced dead.

"We must stop the abandonment of the hostages... I have come to the conclusion that only our intervention can shake those who need to be shaken," Arnon Bar-David said in a statement on Sunday.

"Starting tomorrow at six in the morning, the entire Israeli economy will go on complete strike."

As part of the strike "all take-offs and landings at Ben Gurion airport will stop from 8:00 am (0500 GMT)," Bar-David said.

"We need to reach a deal, a deal that is more important than anything else," he said.

"A deal is not progressing due to political considerations and this is unacceptable."

Israeli far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has labelled the planned strike as "illegal, saying the work stoppage would have negative repercussions on the economy in a time of war and threatening that participants who miss work will not receive their wages.

Earlier on Sunday, the Israeli military announced it had recovered the bodies of six captives from a tunnel in Gaza, sparking anger and grief among families of captives.

Some 251 captives were seized during Hamas's 7 October Al-Aqsa Flood Operation, 97 of whom remain captive in Gaza.

Scores were released during a negotiated one-week truce in November.

Israel's military campaign on the Gaza Strip since 7 October has killed at least 40,738 people, with another over 94,154 people wounded, mostly women and children, according to the Palestinian health ministry.

The United States, Egypt and Qatar have served as mediators during months-long talks to secure a ceasefire and captive release deal between Israel and Hamas but PM Netanyahu has moved the goalpost at every turn in the negotiations to avoid signing any deal.

"The cries of our children being murdered in the tunnels in Gaza is unacceptable," Bar-David said.

"We are in a state of flux, and we don't stop receiving body bags."

'End this war'
 

On Sunday afternoon, captives' loved ones and hundreds of their supporters gathered outside a government office where a cabinet meeting was scheduled to take place.

Blowing whistles, banging drums and screaming through loudspeakers, they demanded that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government make concessions so a deal could be finalised.

"Stop murdering the hostages by your actions, by your decisions. You are killing them, they are in the tunnels and you must sign the deal. We must end this war," shouted Eyal Kalderon, cousin of French-Israeli captive Ofer Kalderon who is still being held.

"Unfortunately, I think that they hear us, but they have different issues that worry them," Kalderon later told AFP. "Political issues, they want to stay on their chair."

Kalderon said he had been calling for a general strike for months and was happy the Histadrut union was taking action.

"This was supposed to take place six months ago. But at least maybe it will help to save the lives" of those still held in Gaza, he said.

Hannah Bartell also joined the demonstration, carrying a sign featuring a picture of US-Israeli Hersh Goldberg-Polin, who was among the six announced dead on Sunday.

The sign read "BRING HERSH HOME", and Bartell had placed across it a piece of masking tape on which she had written "Sorry" in English and Hebrew.

"I don't know if they're hearing me clearly up until this point," she said of the government, adding that she hoped people supported the general strike.

"I'll continue to be here. I'll continue to bring more friends with me, because it gets more and more important with each day that passes that we need a deal."