Canadians have staged a protest in Toronto to demand an end to the Israeli genocide of Palestinians in the besieged Gaza Strip, denouncing the Western support for Tel Aviv.
The protesters marched on the US Consulate General on Sunday, as they held banners and Palestinian flags, and chanted “Hey, hey, ho, ho, the occupation has got to go.”
“We’re here to demand an immediate ceasefire, to demand an end to both US and Canadian funding and support of Israel’s genocide, and also to call on Canadian people to join us, to take a stand, to lift Israel’s 70-year long siege on Gaza, whereby Israel controls Gaza’s air, land and water,” Yara Shoufani, a member of Palestinian Youth Movement Toronto, said.
The rally, which was organized by the Palestinian Youth Movement Toronto, was also attended by members of the Independent Jewish Voices.
“We’re here as Jews to stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people, demanding an immediate ceasefire, demanding Israel let in humanity and aid. They’ve only let in a shameful 80 trucks. End the genocide and the occupation, and Canadian complicity in all this,” Gur Tsabar, a member of Independent Jewish Voices, said.
“Secondly, to speak to all my fellow Jews, a lot of us are descendants of the Holocaust and we all need to look deep down inside, because this is straight-up genocide and it’s being done in our names,” Tsabar added.
Alisa Gayle, another member of Independent Jewish Voices, said “As a Jew, I am absolutely heartbroken. It is devastating to see that this is being done in our name. It’s never anti-Semitic to criticize Israel or to criticize war crimes.”
“We need to stop this. We need our government to demand a ceasefire. We need the ceasefire now. We’ve already lost thousands and thousands of innocent civilians. And it’s horrible collective punishment.”
Similar solidarity rallies have rocked several countries across the world since the start of the Israeli aggression earlier this month, including those whose governments have expressed staunch support for the Israeli regime, such as the United States, the United Kingdom, and other European countries.
Israel launched the war on Gaza on October 7 after the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas waged the surprise Operation Al-Aqsa Storm against the occupying entity in response to the Israeli regime’s decades-long campaign of bloodletting and devastation against Palestinians.
Tel Aviv has also blocked water, food, and electricity to Gaza, plunging the coastal strip into a humanitarian crisis.
The regime has further ordered 1.1 million people in the north of Gaza to evacuate and move south of the coastal sliver.
However, it has continued to rain down bombs on the south.
The aggression has so far killed 8,005 Palestinians, including 3,342 children, and injured more than 20,000 people, 70 percent of them children.
