Israel-Hamas war: in London, Paris or Zurich, major demonstrations in support of the Palestinians

2023-10-29 04:04:39

Tens of thousands of people demonstrated in support of the Palestinians in London on Saturday, as did thousands in Paris and Zurich, while the Gaza Strip was bombed again on the 22nd day of the war sparked by the Hamas attack, the deadliest in Israeli history.

In the British capital, for the third consecutive weekend, a procession was formed at the call of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) movement: it left the banks of the Thames to follow a route leading to Parliament Square, not far from Big Ben, while more than a thousand police officers were mobilized.

“A humanitarian pause is not enough, there must be a complete ceasefire,” said one demonstrator, Dani Nadiri, a 36-year-old television producer, “it is time to do something rather than further escalation.” Condemning both the Hamas attacks and the Israeli government, “which has a much bigger arsenal,” Amar Picha, 31, a marketing project manager, lamented the “destroyed innocent lives.”

London police announced two arrests: that of a man suspected of assaulting a police officer, who was taken to hospital, and that of another man for a public order offense aggravated by his character racial and death threats.

3,000 to 4,000 demonstrators in Paris

In Paris, thousands took part, peacefully, in a rally “in support of the Palestinian people”, banned by the authorities, notably shouting “Gaza, Gaza, Paris is with you!” » and “It is humanity that is being murdered, children of Gaza, children of Palestine”. At 10:15 p.m., police headquarters reported 21 arrests and 1,487 fines.

Place du Châtelet, in the city center, the crowd was prevented from moving by a very large police force. Among the 3,000 and 4,000 demonstrators, according to the police, were elected officials. “The emergency is the ceasefire, to stop killing women, children, men,” said the deputy mayor of Corbeil-Essonne, in the Paris region, Elsa Touré, on site, while affirming that “the Israeli state has been walking on international law for years”.

A large police force had been deployed in the capital. AFP/Geoffroy Van der Hasselt AFP or licensors

In Marseille, a demonstration, this one authorized, brought together 1,800 people according to the police headquarters, 4,000 according to its organizers.

In Switzerland, in Zurich, the demonstrators numbered some 7,000, according to the organizers, “several thousand”, according to the police. There were 2,000 in Lausanne, 1,800 in Geneva, more than a thousand in Bern.