AMMAN — Heeding a call from Palestinian
activists to join
them in solidarity and protest on Tuesday, in what was dubbed a “Day of
Action”, Jordanians took to the streets once more on Tuesday.
اضافة اعلان
Hundreds gathered in Amman’s Rabieh neighborhoos, between
Al-Kalouty Mosque, Cambridge school, and Al-Salheen Mosque. The crowds marched
towards the Israeli embassy, meeting at Omar Ben Abdul Aziz, Street where the
roads were blocked by gendarme right.
“The blood of the martyrs is asking my blood: why did you
settle for a peaceful treaty?” the protesters chanted, while some burned
Israeli flags.
Protesters yelled: “Who said the people died? The people are
furious in the streets.”
Israel’s intense bombing campaign on Gaza has killed 213
Palestinians, including 61 children, and wounded more than 1,400 people in Gaza
in more than a week of fighting against Islamist group Hamas, according to the
health ministry in Gaza, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.
Palestinians across the West Bank and in Israeli-annexed
east Jerusalem mobilized Tuesday for protests and a general strike that
shuttered non-essential businesses, in support of those under bombardment in
Gaza, according to
AFP.
“I want to stand up for my people. Since I can’t be there
physically, the least I can do is protest here in hopes of making a change,”
Sara, a twenty-year-old protestor, told Jordan News.
“I hope this starts a movement that leads the government to
actually move forward to a free Palestine. The people with power just sitting
at home doing nothing, I hope this moves them to see that people want change
and they won’t stop until they get it. Even if the change is not instant, we
need to keep fighting,” Sara added.
The young protester, with her head wrapped in a Palestinian
keffiyeh (popular headwear worn throughout the Levant), pointed out that the
issue has been taking an emotional toll, citing that “people have not been able
to sleep.”
Another protester, Bilal Abu Slayyeh, described the
Palestinian movement as a “unanimous uprising”.
“The people, in Gaza, Jerusalem, the West Bank, or within
the territories occupied in 48 — they are speaking out for their rights and
their land,” Slayyeh said. “I am here to also teach my son, even if he is too
young to understand, that Palestine is ours. Whether I’m Jordanian, Syrian, or
Iraqi, it’s my country. That’s how we were raised in Jordan.”
The fight is continuous and intergenerational, according to
Slayyeh. His demand, as per the previous protests, is to sever diplomatic ties
between Jordan and Israel, including the revoking of the gas deal with Israel —
$10 billion supply deal with a US Israeli consortium led by Texas-based Noble
Energy, to provide gas to the country’s power plants for electricity generation
through the gas — and closing the Israeli embassy in Amman.
Banners held by demonstrators reiterated similar demands,
with some reading “gas does not become blood” and “free Palestine.”
Jordanians have organized daily protests in Rabieh,
Al-Karameh town near the border, and downtown Amman, among other sites, since
the beginning of unrest on the other side of the border.
The latest Israel-Gaza conflict was sparked after clashes
broke out at occupied Jerusalem’s flashpoint Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-Haram Al-Sharif
— one of Islam’s holiest sites — after Israeli forces clashed with Palestinians
on May 7.
This followed a crackdown against protests over planned
evictions of Palestinians in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of occupied East
Jerusalem.
Israel has been trying to contain violence between Jews and
Israeli Arabs, as well as unrest in the occupied West Bank, where Palestinian
authorities say Israeli forces have killed 22 Palestinians since May 10.
After two hours under the sun, some protesters succumbed to
the heat.
One protester was seen leaving the protest limping.
“I was in the frontline of protesters and there was some
pushing from both the police and the protesters. I told the policeman that I
have nerve damage in my leg, and he hit me on it,” he told Jordan News.
“They’re hitting people on the knees.”
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