RT: Tens of thousands of demonstrators have marched across London to
protest Israel's Operation Protective Edge, carrying signs reading
“Gaza: End the siege.” Rallies also took place in France, Ireland and
Israel as the Palestinian death toll surpassed 1,000.Metropolitan Police placed the number of participants in London at around 45,000, The Independent reported. The demonstration, which began near High Street Kensington, passed the Israeli Embassy and eventually reached Parliament Square. Participants chanted, “Long live Gaza; long live Palestine” as they marched.
Several high profile speakers addressed the crowd, including Labour MP Diane Abbot, who said the participants were there to show solidarity with the people of Gaza.
Saturday’s march occurred in the context of a 12-hour ceasefire between Israel and Hamas that began at 8 a.m. local time. Israel said that while it would adhere to the ceasefire, it would also continue to look for tunnels potentially used by the Hamas resistance.
Over 100 bodies were recovered from the rubble in Gaza on Saturday, many of which were partially decomposed, Palestinian health official Ashraf al-Kidra said.
Israel launched a major air campaign in Gaza on July 8 and later sent ground troops into Hamas-ruled territory.
According to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), Operation Protective Edge is aimed at halting Palestinian rocket fire and destroying Hamas’ cross-border tunnels. The conflict has been ongoing for 19 days, with Israel’s Iron Dome intercepting the majority of rockets fired from the Gaza Strip.
In addition to the loss of Palestinian lives, at least 40 Israeli army soldiers have been killed.
"Our [British] aid and arms are helping to kill these innocent people in Gaza,” he said. Last year, Britain sold some $10.7 million worth of arms to Israel.
Other cities across the UK also staged protests on Saturday – including Oxford, Cardiff, and Edinburgh. A similar, smaller protest marched on Downing Street a week ago, with less than half the number of protesters taking part.
Paris rally takes place despite ban, dozens arrested
Hundreds of demonstrators also took to the streets of Paris on Saturday, clashing with police after a ban imposed by French authorities was defied.Police said that 50 people were arrested over the course of the day. French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said that organizers would be held responsible. He stressed that only five out of approximately 300 protests in the country had been banned, and that prohibiting the mass action was the exception rather than the rule.
The protest had been banned due to police fears over the security of the march route, France 24 reported. A rally on July 22 finished with hundreds of protesters looting shops, burning cars and attacking a synagogue. However, one of its organizers said the decision was political.
Seven foreign ministers met in Paris on Saturday and called for an extension of the ceasefire. France issued a joint statement with the US, Britain, Germany, Italy, Qatar, and Turkey, as well as the EU's deputy foreign minister.
Meanwhile, some 2,000 people were permitted to march peacefully in Marseilles.
Demonstrations in Ireland, Israel and Canada
Thousands also turned up in Dublin, with Palestinian and Irish speakers addressing the crowd from a makeshift stage near the Israeli embassy.Tel Aviv was also home to thousands of anti-war protesters on Saturday. The demonstrators carried signs bearing slogans such as “bury the rifles, not the children.”
Canada's Toronto saw two protests running simultaneously: to support Israel and against its operation in Gaza. Hundreds of people came to both rallies and as the two met - divided by a police cordon - tensions spiked with insults flying.
Protests demanding an end to Israel's operation in Gaza have been gripping the world for over a week. Thousands have also been taking part in demonstrations in the West Bank, since Hamas leaders called on Ramallah to come out for its cause. Rallies there have been ongoing for two nights, with Israel using “riot dispersal means” to break them up. Six people have been killed since the night demonstrations began, medics and witnesses told the Guardian on Friday.
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Israel Stops Genocide For Another 24 Hours, Gaza Death Toll Surpasses 1,000
Israel steps up operation in Gaza LIVE UPDATES
The ceasefire has been prolonged until Sunday at midnight, the country's cabinet decided late Saturday .
"At the request of the United nations, the cabinet has approved a humanitarian hiatus until tomorrow (Sunday) at 24:00," an unnamed official said in a statement.
However, Israel warned that it will retaliate if Hamas fires rockets from Gaza territory. In addition, the IDF "will continue to neutralize the terror tunnels inside Gaza. Four terror tunnels were neutralized in Gaza on Saturday, despite the ceasefire that was in place from 8:00 a.m.," the Jerusalem Post reported.
Hamas rejected Israel's 24-hour extension of the humanitarian ceasefire, a spokesman for the group said.
The Israeli Security Council is set to reconvene on Sunday morning to reevaluate the situation.
The Palestinian death toll from Israel's 19-day operation is over 1,040 people, Gaza’s Health Ministry told AFP.
On Saturday, Hamas ignored an Israeli announcement that it would extend the 12-hour truce by four hours and resumed firing rockets into from Gaza.
Despite the 12-hour cease-fire, the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) has
urged the Palestinians, who earlier left their homes in Gaza, to
“refrain from returning.”
“The IDF shall respond if terrorists choose to exploit this time to attack IDF personnel or fire at Israeli civilians,” the military’s spokesperson also said in a statement, adding that Israel will continue “the operational activities to locate and neutralize tunnels in the Gaza Strip” during the ceasefire.
However, thousands of Palestinians ignored IDF warnings and returned to their Gaza homes to find scores of houses demolished and wreckage blocking the roads.
The residents encountered widespread destruction in the northern town of Beit Hanoun.
“Nothing is left. Everything I have is gone,” a Palestinian woman from the town told AP.
Al-Kidra spoke of 20 members of an extended family, including at least 10 children, who were killed by tank fire that hit a building on the edge of the town of Khan Younis.
Their funeral took place on Saturday, with hundreds of men marching, chanting "There is only God!" while carrying the bodies wrapped in white cloth.
Israeli military’s death toll in the ground offensive has reached 40, with the IDF announcing that three of their soldiers were killed in Gaza in the early hours on Saturday.
Paris meeting calls for ceasefire extension
Western foreign ministers from the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Qatar, Turkey and the US have called for an extension of the 12-hour cease-fire between Hamas and Israel during their meeting in Paris."All of us want to obtain, as quickly as possible, a durable, negotiated ceasefire that responds both to Israeli needs in terms of security and to Palestinian needs in terms of the social-economic development [of Gaza] and access to the territory of Gaza," Laurent Fabius, France’s foreign minister, stressed.
His British counterpart, Philip Hammond, added that “the necessity right now is to stop the loss of life” in Gaza.
“And we stop the loss of life by getting this ceasefire to roll over for 12 hours, 24 hours or 48 hours – and then again until we have established the level of confidence that allows the parties to sit round a table to talk about the substantive issues,” Hammond explained.
Israel launched a major air campaign in Gaza on July 8 and later
sent ground troops into Hamas-ruled territory.
The IDF say that Operation Protective Edge is aimed at halting Palestinian rocket fire and destroying Hamas’s cross-border tunnels. On Saturday, at least four more tunnel shafts were discovered by the IDF. The military vowed to continue their mission in the strip.
Source
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Pro-Palestinian Demos Held Across World
Pro-Palestinian
demonstrators have taken to streets around the world calling for an end
to the Israeli regime’s bloodshed in the war-torn Gaza Strip.
Zionist Orwellian UK BANNED Press TV: Public outrage against Israel’s genocidal pummelling of the coastal enclave led to demos around the globe on Saturday.In Bahrain, pro-Palestinian activists rallied on the streets of the Karranah village, west of capital Manama, to call on the international community to react to Tel Aviv’s atrocities in Gaza.
Protesters also took to streets of two major Canadian cities of Ottawa and Toronto to censure Israel for its offensive against Gaza on the pretext of self defense.
Similar demos were held elsewhere on the planet, including in London, Paris, and Edinburgh.
The Palestinian death toll has reached more than 1,000 from over two weeks of Israeli strikes. Thousands of Palestinians have also been injured in the onslaught.
Israeli warplanes have been carrying out incessant airstrikes against the blockaded Gaza Strip since July 8. On July 17, thousands of Israeli soldiers launched a ground incursion into the densely-populated strip.
The Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas, has been launching retaliatory attacks against Israel.
While Israel confirms 40 Israelis have been killed in the war, Hamas sources put the number at about 90.
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