PALESTINIANS have come out in force in the Gaza Strip to protest against US recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s ‘capital’, burning pictures of President Trump and the Saudi king.
The rally, organised by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), drew thousands in the besieged enclave to protest at the most serious attack in recent years to the third holiest site in Islam.
The protesters set fire to American and Israeli flags as well as the portraits and effigies of US President Donald Trump, and tore up pictures of Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz and Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman.
Under the new plan, the US recognises Israeli claims on the entire city as its ‘capital’.
‘Al-Quds is Palestine’s eternal capital and not an inch of it will be conceded,’ to Israel, Jamil Mazhar, a PFLP leader, told the rally.
The protesters also condemned what they called the Arab states’ alignment with Washington and held up placards reading ‘Down with Al Saud’.
Yaacov Nagel, who stepped down as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s internal security adviser earlier this year, said last month that Saudi Arabia was ready to sacrifice Palestinians and their demands for closer ties with Israel.
On Friday, Palestinian officials expressed worries that Saudi Arabia was acting behind the scenes to advance a United States ‘grand bargain’ over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that heavily favours Israel.
Four Palestinian officials said that the Saudi crown prince had communicated a proposal to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas that would give away the right of return for Palestinian refugees and the status of al-Quds as the capital of a future Palestinian state in return for conditions that were unfavourable to the Palestinians.
A Palestinian young man was seriously injured by Israeli forces’ fire while dozens others, including school students, were suffocated yesterday as Israeli forces attacked them with tear gas during clashes that erupted in al-Arroub refugee camp, near Hebron, and in Bethlehem.
Clashes erupted in the aftermath of the rally in al-Arroub refugee camp. The soldiers fired rubber-coated steel rounds at the protesters, seriously injuring a young man in his head. They also used tear gas canisters to disperse the protesters, causing multiple cases of suffocation by tear gas inhalation.
During the clashes, soldiers chased some of the protesting students and fired tear gas canisters inside the campus of Palestine Technical University in the refugee camp. Similar clashes also erupted in Aida refugee camp, near Bethlehem. There were reports of suffocation cases among the protesters as a result of Israeli forces’ heavy use of tear gas to disperse them.
An Israeli military vehicle yesterday ran over a girl in Hebron, south of the West Bank. The vehicle ran over five-year-old Razan Jaber who sustained an injury in her foot. She was transferred to Hebron government hospital to receive treatment.
