The first vaccines against Israel Covid-19 were easy. Now comes the hard part.

“I’m healthy, my body knows how to overcome itself,” said Tamir Hefetz, 46, one of the organizers of the anti-vaccine rally. “The green passport is a terrible thing.”

In the final stages of its vaccination action, Israel is trying to convince patients to get vaccinated before new variants of the coronavirus increase infection levels again, causing more damage to the country’s economy.

But the Israeli government’s tough pockets of resistance point to the struggles that await many Western countries, including the United States, once they have inoculated much of their populations.

“The further ahead, the harder it becomes,” Israeli Health Minister Yuli Edelstein said in an interview. “It’s exactly like running a marathon.”

With more than 55% of its population receiving at least one shot and more than 46% with two, Israel’s vaccine campaign has reached a critical stage. After reaching a maximum of more than 230,000 shots a day in mid-January, the launch of the vaccine has slowed in recent weeks to reach 100,000 a day.

Experts warn that if Israel wants to achieve a certain level of immunity and detection that will allow it to get out of repeated cycles of economic openings and closures, that pace must be accelerated.

Gili Regev, director of the epidemiology division at Sheba Medical Center, said Israel will not achieve herd immunity with the British variant until 80% of the population is vaccinated, currently impossible until children under 16 can make the shot. Before, he said, just inoculating as many people as possible over 16 will improve the outlook.

“The more people get vaccinated, the safer it is for everyone,” he said.

Dr. Regev estimates that only about 4% of Israelis who are offered a vaccine reject it, but there are many others who have not bothered to receive the shot, even though cities have created inoculation sites. mobile and public awareness campaigns. The Israeli government has also developed an elaborate incentive system, based on green passports, that allows vaccinated people to access fitness, catering and entertainment options that are mostly closed during successive blockades and are still in use. largely closed to the unvaccinated.

Since the start of the vaccination campaign, Israel’s health maintenance organizations have targeted everyone eligible with text messages, phone calls, and emails to lure them to vaccination sites.

These appeals are still heard by people like Katy Drabkin of Holon, a city south of Tel Aviv. He recently cycled through a city vaccination center and then urged several people in line not to fire. She doesn’t trust major media reports about vaccines and doesn’t know she is discriminated against for refusing a shot.

“What’s happening now is that our media belongs to the establishment, which belongs to people with a personal interest,” he said. “So now they just convince everyone that there is a dangerous pandemic.”

Shiri, 45, who attended the anti-vaccine rally in Tel Aviv but refused to give her last name because she feared the repercussions for her business, also doubts it is worth a shot. She took her husband and three children to hand out vaccine stickers to passersby.

“I’m not sure if this is safe or works,” he said, referring to the vaccine.

Israel initially did well during the first wave of the pandemic, but experienced a second parallel wave after reopening too quickly over the summer, forcing a second blockade. The country closed again in December after the spread of the most contagious British variant of the virus caused a third wave that was the worst of all. So far, more than 6,000 people have died from Covid-19, and the shutdowns have cost the Israeli economy billions of dollars.

The campaign for the vaccine is influencing some issues. Amos Yekutiel, of Jerusalem, said he had no plans to get vaccinated, but he did so after passing a vaccination site set up at a neighborhood bar. His friends who warned him he could not visit him until he was vaccinated pushed the 36-year-old consultant through the door.

“I’m not a conspiracy theorist, I just didn’t think I needed it myself,” he said. Now that he has changed his mind, he is excited to go to restaurants and attend a group dinner. “It gives you more freedom.”

To further influence skeptics, Israel’s health ministry is also targeting misinformation about vaccines, mostly spread through social media. Health officials are collaborating with the Israeli Ministry of Justice to eliminate false information about vaccines and also publish information to discredit vaccine myths.

In Jerusalem, two religious students said that although many of their friends had urged them not to get vaccinated, they finally moved on after asking questions to doctors and volunteer doctors about how it works and consulting their parents.

“[At first] we looked at each other and said “of course not,” said Yaakov Silverman, 21, who was eating ice cream when a volunteer found him and his friend and suggested he get vaccinated at a nearby bar. . “But we asked a couple of questions … and we talked about it and we said,‘ Why don’t we? “

—Dov Lieber in Tel Aviv contributed to this article.