Tens of thousands of demonstrators gathered outside of Melbourne’s State Library Victoria to speak in defence of Palestine on Saturday.
Footage shows protesters marching, holding Palestinian flags and signs reading: ‘One child is too many! But 11,500…? Stop bombing kids’ and ‘More than 100 Palestinian children killed by Israel every day. Why are you silent,’ among others, and chanting: ‘Israel, USA, how many kids did you kill today?’ ‘In the thousands, in the millions, we are all Palestinians!’
One of the organizers stated that for two consecutive weekends, about a hundred thousand people participated in their demonstrations in support of Palestine. She added that all protesters ‘have been the embodiment of the values that the Palestinian cause and that this movement raises to defend’ such as humanity, freedom, justice and equality.
“The Australian people see images of children being killed; families being torn apart. They see kids without parents being discharged from a hospital with no home to go to. And they want our government to lend its support and its strength to end the bombing, to end the killing, and we want the same,” a protester was quoted by AFP as saying.
Thousands of demonstrators has been gathering in Melbourne for twelve weeks in a row, supporting people of Gaza and demanding a lasting ceasefire and the fundamental rights of freedom and self-determination for the Palestinian people.
Israel declared a ‘complete siege’ of Gaza, with a large-scale campaign of air strikes. A ground incursion began at the end of the third week, with Israeli leaders vowing to ‘wipe out’ Hamas. Palestinian officials reported that over 21,000 people had been killed and more than 55,000 injured at the time of publication.
The Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) claimed that Hamas locations and infrastructure were targeted in the response. However, United Nations experts warned against ‘collective punishment’ for the people of Gaza, before predicting a ‘humanitarian crisis’ and then claimed that ‘hell is settling in for the region.
(Source: AFP)
