Thousands join pro-Palestinian marches in several European cities

LONDON: Thousands of people on Saturday joined pro-Palestinian marches in London, Berlin and Dublin calling for an end to Israeli strikes on Gaza, three years after Hamas's Oct 7 attack.

Several thousand marchers in London carried placards reading "End the genocide" and "Free Palestine" as they made their way along the route near the British parliament.

"We are here today to mark three years of the ongoing genocide in Gaza," Aimee Shalan, director of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, told AFP.

Western sanctions over settler violence did not go far enough, she said, calling for "full sanctions on Israel."

A ceasefire began a year ago and although Israel has reduced its level of attacks it has kept striking Gaza on a near-daily basis.

Strikes have killed some 1,450 Palestinians since the ceasefire, according to Gaza's health ministry.

London police said they had arrested 20 people including a man and a woman with placards supporting the organisation Palestine Action, banned under UK law.

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Recent graduate Hibo Hassan, 23, said she was there to show her solidarity.

"Although it is happening in the Middle East, it affects us here now," she said.

"It's extremely dystopian and that is something we should be all scared about," she added.

Another protester, a 32-year-old Kosovar immigrant who gave his name as Kobe, said his own experience of war made him want to "stand up today and not let history repeat" itself.

A small counter-demonstration was organised by Stop The Hate UK, a Jewish-led, pro-Israel campaign group.

Ahead of the protest, organised by the Palestine Coalition, London's Metropolitan Police said it would be using powers under public order legislation to require anyone wearing a face covering to hide their identity to remove it.

"We will take a zero-tolerance approach to hate crime and other offending," said senior Met officer Carl Galvin.

In Berlin, a similar march organised by the group United for Palestine drew around 3,500 people as it set off from a square between the chancellery and parliament, said police.

Many denounced Germany's arms exports to Israel, carrying banners and placards condemning Berlin's military support.

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For decades, Germany has seen resolute support for Israel as a fundamental duty largely because of Nazi Germany's responsibility for the genocide of millions of European Jews during the Holocaust.

"I find it really terrible that Germany finds it so difficult to criticise Israel," a student told AFP, who asked not to be named.

In Dublin, protesters took part in a march organised by the Irish Palestine Solidarity Campaign.

Saturday's protests came three days after the third anniversary of the Oct 7, 2023 attack.

The attack was the deadliest in Israel's history, resulting in the deaths of 1,221 people, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.

Resistance fighters also took 251 hostages into Gaza, 44 of them already dead.

In response, Israel launched a military offensive that has left most of Gaza in ruins and killed more than 74,200 people, according to Gaza's health ministry.