Pro-Palestinian protesters rally in Washington to mark a painful present and past
WASHINGTON — Hundreds of protesters rallying within sight of the Capitol chanted pro-Palestinian slogans and voiced criticism of the Israeli and U.S. governments as they marked a painful present — the war in Gaza — and past.
The rally commemorated the 76th anniversary of what is called the Nakba, the Arabic word for “catastrophe,” and refers to the 700,000 Palestinians who fled or were forced from what is now Israel when the state was created in 1948. The rally drew about 400 demonstrators amid steady rain at the National Mall.
In January, thousands of pro-Palestinian activists flooded the Mall in one of the larger protests in recent memory in the District of Columbia.
On Saturday, there were calls in support of Palestinian rights and an immediate end to Israeli military operations in the Gaza Strip. Cries of “No peace on stolen land” and “End the killings/stop the crime/Israel out of Palestine” echoed through the crowd.
Reem Lababdi, a George Washington University sophomore who said she was pepper-sprayed last week when police broke up a campus protest encampment, acknowledged that the rain seemed to limit the number of attendees.
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“I’m proud of every single person who turned out in this weather to speak their minds and send their message,” she said.
This year’s event is fueled by anger over the siege of Gaza. The war began when Hamas and other militants stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, killing about 1,200 people and taking 250 hostages. Palestinian militants still hold about 100 captives; Israel said Friday its troops in Gaza had recovered the bodies of three Israelis killed by attackers near a music festival. Israel’s military has killed more than 35,000 Palestinians in Gaza, according to the Health Ministry.
The Israeli military says it found the bodies of three hostages in Gaza, including German Israeli Shani Louk, killed by Hamas at a music festival.
There is widespread anger, too, over the violent crackdown on pro-Palestinian protest camps at universities across the country. In recent weeks, long-term encampments at more than 60 schools have been broken up by police.
In addition to pressing Israel and the Biden administration for an immediate end to hostilities in Gaza, the protesters are expected to push for the right of return for Palestinian refugees — a long-standing Israeli red line in decades of start-and-stop negotiations.
After the Arab-Israeli war that followed Israel’s establishment, Israel refused to allow the refugees to return because it would have resulted in a Palestinian majority. Instead, they became a seemingly permanent refugee community that now numbers some 6 million, with many living in urban camps in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and the Israeli-occupied West Bank. In Gaza, the refugees and their descendants make up around three-quarters of the population.
Associated Press writer Khalil reported form Washington. AP reporter Joseph Krauss in Jerusalem contributed to this report.
Religious Zionists, most believing in a divine right to govern, now have outsize influence in Israel. The war in the Gaza Strip is energizing their settlement push.
Mohamad Abdelfattah, a critical-care doctor, was in the southern city of Rafah with no way of leaving. He was volunteering in one of the few hospitals that has remained open in the besieged city.
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