THOUSANDS of people in countries across the world have held pro-Palestinian rallies condemning the Israeli regime’s savagery against Palestinian people in the besieged Gaza Strip.
According to media estimates, some 5,000 Australians attended a peaceful pro-Palestinian rally in Sydney, the capital of Australia’s most populous state of New South Wales, on Sunday despite police threats to curb such demonstrations.
The Australian protesters waved Palestine flags and chanted ‘Free, free Palestine’ as hundreds of police patrolled the area.
‘We are not against Jewish people,’ said Mustafa, a protester at the rally. ‘They have been in Palestine for a long time, side by side with the Muslims and the Christians, we are all Palestinians. We are against the Zionists.’
Thousands also held pro-Palestine rallies in Adelaide, the capital of South Australia, and in the Victorian state capital of Melbourne.
The cities of Rome in Italy and Berlin in Germany were also the scene of protests against the Israeli crimes in Gaza on Sunday.
Thousands of pro-Palestinian demonstrators marched in central London on Saturday, and called for an end to Israel’s military action in the besieged Gaza Strip.
The protesters, many of them waving Palestinian flags and signs saying ‘Free Palestine’, gathered close to Oxford Circus from where they headed to Downing Street.
Also on Sunday, Turkish protesters in two of the country’s largest cities voiced their support for Palestinians and condemned Israel’s war on Gaza.
The crowd in Istanbul marched from the Beyazit Mosque to the Hagia Sophia, chanting slogans against Israel. In Ankara, protesters in Anitpark waved Palestinian and Turkish flags.
‘We see today those who see themselves as superior in the world can send their ships, tanks, planes etc. for Israel. We can only say words of condemnation. We request that this ends, for the only main topic of this century to be the salvation of Palestine, for a free Palestine, free Al-Aqsa Mosque to be left to the coming generations,’ said 37-year-old small business owner, Baris Akbas.
Rallies in support of Palestine were also held in Egypt, Morocco, Malaysia, Jordan, Lebanon, Canada and the United States.
- The World Health Organisation (WHO) says the Israeli military has wiped out entire Palestinian families in the Gaza Strip as it presses ahead with its bombardment campaign against the besieged coastal enclave.
Palestinian resistance movement Hamas launched Operation Al-Aqsa Storm last Saturday, penetrating deep into the territories occupied by the Israel regime, by carrying out large-scale air, land, and sea strikes.
The group said the operation was a reaction to the recurring desecration of the al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied Jerusalem as well as intensified Israeli atrocities against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank.
Israel responded with intensive air strikes on civilian targets in the Strip, and has stepped up the siege, leaving Gaza, home to more than 2.3 million Palestinians, without water, electricity, and internet.
They have also destroyed some 135,000 houses and residential blocks since the beginning of the savage attacks.
The Gaza Health Ministry confirmed yesterday that, since October 7th, 9,600 Palestinians have been wounded, and 2,750 have been killed – 1,030 of these are children.
- United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has warned that the West Asia region is ‘on the verge of an abyss’ as the situation in the Gaza Strip rapidly deteriorates amid the unrelenting bombardment of the enclave by the Israeli military.
‘We are on the verge of the abyss in the Middle East,’ Guterres warned in a statement on Sunday.
He called on the Palestinian Hamas resistance movement to release all Israeli captives ‘immediately’ and ‘without conditions’, and urged the Tel Aviv regime to allow humanitarian aid supplies into Gaza.
‘Gaza is running out of water, electricity and other essential supplies,’ Guterres noted in the statement.
United Nations stocks of food, water, medical supplies and fuel in Egypt, Jordan, the West Bank and the Israeli-occupied territories ‘can be dispatched within hours’, he said, adding that staff ‘need to be able to bring these supplies into and throughout Gaza safely, and without impediment.
‘Each one of these two objectives is valid in themselves. They should not become bargaining chips, and they must be implemented because it is the right thing to do,’ stated Guterres, who emphasised it was his duty to make both appeals ‘in this dramatic moment.’
Meanwhile, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) has called upon the Israeli authorities to protect all civilians sheltering in UN facilities across the besieged Gaza Strip, including those in Gaza City and in the northern flank of the coastal enclave.
Despite the Israeli order to evacuate more than one million persons from northern Gaza and Gaza City to the southern Gaza Strip, many, particularly pregnant women, children, the elderly and persons with disabilities, will not be able to flee the area, UNRWA warned in a statement.
‘They have no choice and must be protected at all times,’ the statement read.
Wars have rules, UNRWA stressed, noting that ‘civilians, hospitals, schools, clinics and United Nations premises cannot be a target.’
The UN agency emphasised that it is sparing no efforts to advocate with parties to the conflicts to meet their obligations under international law to protect civilians, including those seeking refuge in UNRWA shelters.
Meanwhile, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian has warned that the Islamic Republic will not remain a bystander if the Israeli occupying regime presses ahead with its savagery against the Palestinian people in the besieged Gaza Strip.
‘UNRWA shelters in Gaza and northern Gaza are no longer safe. This is unprecedented,’ the statement said.
‘This war should be no exception, protection of civilians and civilian infrastructure, including United Nations buildings, applies to this conflict too,’ the statement concluded.
On October 7th, Hamas launched Operation al-Aqsa Storm deep into the territories occupied by the Israeli regime. The operation involved large-scale air, land, and sea strikes.
- The Iraqi parliament has called for the activation of the Arab Defence Treaty against the Israeli regime in response to its relentless onslaught against the besieged Gaza Strip.
According to a statement released after a special session on the Gaza crisis held last Saturday, Iraqi lawmakers condemned the ‘brutal practices and crimes committed by the Zionist occupation forces against the Palestinian people.’
They also renewed the call for the Arab League to hold an emergency session to condemn Israeli aggression against Gaza and to open corridors to deliver humanitarian, medical and food aid to the Strip.
The Iraqi legislators also called for efforts to ‘activate the League’s Charter considering that any attack on a member is an attack on the Arab countries, activate the Joint Arab Defence Treaty, and address the free world to stand by the Palestinian people, in addition to calling on the United Nations to prevent the killing and deportation of the Palestinian people.’
