About 100,000 turn out in London for pro-Palestine rally
Protesters voice support for Palestinians and demand end to Israel’s bombardment of Gaza
The battle lines are being drawn in the court of public opinion. Now the question becomes how steadfast is the public support behind demanding a peaceful yet forceful resolution to this conflict and finally ending this apartheid regime.
How successful the court of public opinion has been in influencing the outcome of Israel conflict before?
Very. Israel has been on several benders that were curtailed due to international opinion. Unfortunately it's never outrightly solved the issue.
Pretty effective. It's backlash to Israel that has stopped Netanyahu from wiping palestine off the map.
It was successful against South African Apartheid. There's a reason conservatives are trying to literally outlaw the BDS Israel movement. (Boycott, Divest, Sanction)
Israel is not an apartheid regime. That is silly.
Israel has full political and military control of Palestinian land. They control every aspect of their lives. Remember when Jewish people where placed into ghettos and they each had different insignia that would indicate where they were from and were they could travel and what freedoms they had? Israel does the same thing with palestinians.
According to Amnesty International, the world’s leading human rights organisation: “Israel imposes a system of oppression and domination against Palestinians across all areas under its control.” According to B’Tselem, the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories: “The Israeli regime enacts in all the territory it controls an apartheid regime.”
They've self described themselves as that in the past before term became criminalised in the early 2000s
It's at least debatable and certainly not obvious.
Palestinians asking for a homeland. They are at home and have been invaded for over 70 years
I don't think any right-thinking person has any sympathy for Hamas, and rightly so.
However, Palestinians are not automatically members of Hamas. This would be like saying you're "done with" Americans and we should bomb every major American city because of the actions of the Proud Boys and other right-wing militias.
Ah yes let’s „be done“ with a whole group of people, that’s normal rhetoric 👍
Hamas isn't Palestine.
No
Did you start hating all Germans once Hitler got into power? If you didn't, that's mighty hypocritical of you. If you did, that's misguidedly racist as well.
Exactly this. People are oversimplify the whole story. In my opinion there's 2 camps of people who currently supports Palestine.
Concidering how the rich arab countries has reacted during their neighbour's times of need earlier: closing borders and not caring, group number 2 seems likely.
Just picture that the Palestinians actually celebrate Hamas terrorist attack, they feel joy over the actions many of us now have seen on videos and they celebrate it even in the streets in Western countries.
Imagine that 57% of Palestinians supports Hamas and 50% are against the idea of peace, 71% supports PIJ (Islamic Jihad), all while Biden won his election with 51%, Obama won with 53%, George Bush won in 1989 by 53%, last time any president got more votes than the support Hamas has in Palestine was in 1984, 39 years ago! Source about Palestinians support.
That's how enormous the support of Hamas is, and some of ya'll are defending them. You need to watch the videos released of the atrocities Hamas committed, see the actions that you're defending, but I bet you don't even have the stomachs for it.
I'm from Bristol. Haven't seen a single Israeli flag or show of support for Israel in this conflict, but I have seen loads of Palestinian flags waved around, and even witnessed a march last week.
I think public opinion has drastically changed in favour of Palestine.
Israel has the support of powerful governments the world over, it doesn't need the support of a hundred thousand marchers. This is why they get away with what they've done for decades.
Same as for South Africa, basically. Segregation started in 1908. Formal apartheid in 1948. Full on boycotts with government support late 1980's, and 1990 the regime fell.
I think a large part of the issue is that the settlements themselves are actually a reflection of Israel failing to develop vertically. Even without picking a side, even if we ignore the ridiculous hypocrisy of Israel for selling literal spyware tools like Pegasus for the Saudis and other dictators to use on their own citizens and commit murder, the reality is that Israel's current problem with terrorism is entirely of their own making, because they've funded settlements and wasted time and money when they've had more than 20 years since the Nakba, Fatah and had millions of dollars of US funding and done fuck all. Mate, you could be a hardcore Zionist and supporter of the state of Israel, and still think that they've done a shit job.
Good, pity the people's views are seldom represented in government
My experience is the opposite.
I have a lot of Jewish friends and live in a place with a lot of Jewish people, and I see plenty who support Israel and have no problem being loud about their unequivocal support for Israels response. While the comments from my Jewish friends who don't support the response have been much more muted. Except for one girl who is pretty pissed that her suffering from the attacks is being used to justify what she calls is atrocities against the civilians of Gaza. My neighbor even told me over drinks this weekend that he keeps his mouth shut about it because he fears the retaliation (primarily social) from his Jewish community about the fact that he strongly disagrees with Israel's response.
Bristol has a very left wing lean, I've seen the graffiti around. It's a vocal minority. Public opinion is mainly indifference but condemnation of both sides, maybe a bit on Israel's side right now. The way Hamas has conducted themselves I would argue has seriously damaged the perception of the Palestinian cause.
Genuine question: How many, in term of proportion, if you can estimate, of the protesters are non-Muslim, or simply say white people/Chinese etc? I am saying this because they're a lot of Muslims living near cities, especially London, Manchester and Birmingham. Having many muslims protesting for the Palestinians is no brainer, as they share the same values. It's much more impactful if the protesters are consisted of many different religious demographics.
Nice job Londoners.
Removed. I'll try to make this as simple to understand as possible... You can't advocate against the genocide of a people by promoting the genocide of another people. I don't care if the argument is "Palestinians need to die so Israel can exist." Or "Israel needs to die so Palestinians can exist." Neither view is acceptable.
Israel is not a people. It’s a genocidal fascist neocolony. Palestine needs to be decolonized. I’m not advocating for the genocide of French people when I’m saying that Algeria needs to be free. The same applies to Palestine.
So how, exact, do you see the process of making Israel not exist proceeding? Genuinely, I'm curious. Do you really see absolutely no way for a state of Israel to exist in some fashion without the genocide of Palestinians? If not, then what exactly are you proposing?
They want them to die, that’s why they just downvote lol
It’s just another emotional moron commenting based on feels as they have zero fucking clue about the actual context, and they have no interest to learn either. Virtue signaling to make themselves feel better I guess
Edit: keep upvoting the comment that literally is calling for the end of Israel as they “don’t have the right to exist” using some shit strawman with Palestinian genocide as a fulcrum as if that’s what Israel is. The is gov does not define the people just like Hamas doesn’t define Palestine. Are you fucking kidding me?
Israel doesn’t have the right to exist? What kind of brain dead shit are you talking about??
Israel absolutely deserves to exist, they were placed there after they themselves were genocided. THAT is the problem, they were placed there and it’s fucked everything.
Israel absolutely deserves to exist just like Palestine.
If Israel’s very existance is dependent on the genocide of Palestinians, and it is, then it doesn’t deserve to exist. Rights are for people, not countries so kindly stop saying that “Israel has a right to exist”. It doesn’t, Palestinians have a right to exist without being killed and ethnically cleansed from their native lands.
Jesus fucking Christ, how are you this fucking stupid? Israel’s existence is not dependent on the genocide of Palestinians, that’s just a bullshit strawman you just pulled out of your ass so you could knock it down. Rights are indeed for people but guess what, when people say Israel deserves to exist they’re talking about the Israeli people. Those people deserve to not be killed or ethnically purged from their homes as well, the difference is the Israel never should have been placed there. But guess what they were. So what do the Israeli citizens do? If we ask you, I guess your stance is go fuck themselves because of what the Israeli gov has done over the many years. Do you not see how reductive and fucked that is?
Personally, I have always been a free Palestine supporter and a strong hater of Israeli gov but the mindless emotional backlash like the one in your comment only enables more hate and bullshit. Israel deserves to exist they just don’t deserve to exist on other people’s lands. That’s a big fucking difference to the emotional bullshit you vomited out. When you say “it (Israel) doesn’t (have the right to exist)”, it sounds quite similar to the Hamas goal of the extermination of Israel. Hamas doesn’t represent the Palestinian people, yet here you are with this bullshit. No, I’m not saying if you don’t suck netanyahoo’s dick you’re an antisemite, I’m saying if you seriously can’t see that there are an insane number of innocents on each side of this conflict, then you are lost and unreasonable.
Israel absolutely deserves to exist just like Palestine. Jesus fucking Christ
Israel, the Jewish state, doesn't have the right to exist. That doesn't mean the Jews should be pushed into the sea or whatever, but there's absolutely no reason a country that goes "We're the Jewish homeland. Everyone else can eat shit" needs to exist. This is the 21st century, we should oppose the creation of explicit ethnostates.
Aha and why does Israel deserve to exist exactly? I couldn’t care less if every single country in the world disappeared tomorrow. Again, rights are for people, not countries and if your statehood relies on genocide and ethnic cleansing, it needs to go. Call me sympathetic to Hamas talking points all you want. I certainly don’t support their ideology but at the end of the day, one person’s terrorist is another person’s freedom fighter and armed struggle against an occupying force is legal under international law. Hamas isn’t even recognized as a terrorist organization by the UN. Hamas could be flowerpower hippies and they’d still be called “terrorists” by Israel and its allies. Really shows how meaningless that word has become.
Looked to be a lot more than 100k to me
British media likes to undersell any and all protests, they typically take their photos at the end when there's a much lower number of people and then knock at least half off the number of people who attended. Oh and if one person brings a joke flag/banner then you better believe pictures of that from different angles will be all over the place rather than any pictures of actual protestors.
BBC is state run, of course they're going to slant things in favor of the establishment
300,000 apparently
Hardly surprised, the tube outlet right under parliament had pro palestinian posters last I was there
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The shipment of 20 trucks bringing medical supplies offered limited relief to Gaza’s 2.3 million population, under fire and with barely anything to eat or drink.
The home secretary, Suella Braverman, has previously labelled the slogan antisemitic and claimed that it is “widely understood” to call for the destruction of Israel.
A small group of protesters held a separate demonstration in central London on Saturday in which a large banner read, “Muslim armies, rescue the people of Palestine.”
The Met said it was deploying 1,000 officers to police the demonstration, as well as mounting extra patrols around synagogues and places of worship following a 1,350% increase in hate crimes against Jewish people and a 140% rise in Islamophobic incidents.
The Met said there had been “pockets of disorder and some instances of hate speech” in the series of vigils, protests and public gatherings, but that most had “been lawful and taken place without incident”.
In Australia, thousands marched through central Sydney after police gave the event the green light, and rallies were also held in Perth, Hobart and Brisbane.
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Serious question: would this be historically considered Casus Belli for Israel to declare war against the UK?
What is the point of these protests?
The most charitable view:
To show western governments that the population doesn't just blindly side with the Israeli government. A major difference between the two sides who are committing heinous acts, is that one side is a government committing genocide, and the other is a military organization (not the government) which was made in response to being forcibly expelled from their land by that government.
Neither side should be killing innocent civilians, but we should not be collectively taking Israel's side, like is traditionally done.
The least charitable view:
Because people want to get away with yelling Nazi-shit in public.
To say that Israelis aren't the only people needing protection.
Mostly to vent out anti-Semitic frustration in a way that is politically viable
Yeah I don't even know but hey I guess it looks like a lot of people don't like Benji much any more
A lot of people hate that the Hamas atrocities have been weaponized by Netanyahu and he is basically doing this war to escape scrutiny in Israel.
to be fair, if you wave an LGBTQ flag at any protest on TERF island and you'll probably get harrassed
Seems like they're trying to shoehorn their cause into another.
Since many of us left Reddit without any desire to give them traffic, could you please put a warning with your link?
I think the fact that it starts with https://www.reddit.com is probably enough of a warning.
Pretty sure the Israelites taking over the grounds of Palestine happened before HAMAS ever existed.
Palestinians in Gaza have been mistreated for over a decade, they can only enter Israel during the day and have to come back by nightfall. Israel closed the border between Gaza and Egypt. People have been trapped in Gaza and treated like cattle for so long. They have been denied healthcare and basic needs. And the moment a few palestinians revolt against the oppression (even though killings by hamas are horrible), the world denounces palestine as a whole? Have you read about what Israel has been doing for the past decade or so? I think that in it's core, it's a fight for freedom. Hamas' approach is absolutely terrifying, but palestinians can't just stand and watch. How can you make sure your opinions reach the government when they don't want to listen to you? That's the entire point of religious conflicts, Israeli government hates palestinians for just existing. And you tell me that palestinians are supposed to sympathise with the killings in Israel, when Israel has done (and continues to do) atrocities on their people ten times as worse?
Was it horrible for british colonies to fight against the british empire? What would you think the narrative would be if Britain had a colony right now which was trying to revolt? What about everything that the US has done to destroy economies in the middle east, just to line the pockets of the rich? How is this not obvious?
Hamas is nothing in comparison to Israels crimes against the Palestinians.
Are you OK?
LOL that any brit has the guts to be out there protesting when literally they are one of the founding pillars of the conflict
Wait, are you saying that people should never protest against something their country is doing/was involved in?
Nah love you bro