Hundreds hear calls for isolation of Israel at major pro-Palestine solidarity march in Derry

A huge crowd marched from the Waterside to the city centre on Saturday as the clock ticked towards an agreed ceasefire in Gaza that took effect on Sunday.

Becca Bor, a People Before Profit activist and member of Jews for Palestine Ireland, addressing the rally in Guildhall Square, said: "We need to continue to boycott, to divest, to sanction, to isolate Israel, to not allow western Europe, the European Union, and the United States to continue to back Israel to the hilt.”

Paddy Lynch, a local health care worker and activist, spoke of the widespread destruction of medical facilities in the Gaza over the past 15 months.

"The British and American bombs fired by the apartheid state of Israel have not only claimed countless lives but have also decimated Gaza’s health infrastructure leaving its people in a state of despair and suffering.”

Mr. Lynch told the Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign (IPSC) demonstration how it was estimated over 1,200 Palestinian health workers had now been killed and out of 36 hospitals in Gaza only 14 remained operational.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), he said, nearly 600 attacks on health care facilities had been recorded since October 2023.

"These attacks have affected 94 health care facilities including 26 hospitals and 79 ambulances.

"The health care system in Gaza is on the brink of collapse. Make no mistake, every time they target a hospital, a medic or an ambulance, they are committing a war crime,” he declared.

Darach McDonald, from the National Union of Journalists, spoke of the staggering number of his colleagues who have been killed while reporting on the war.

“Last Monday the International Federation of Journalists, representing 600,000 media professionals from 187 trade unions in more than 140 countries, including the NUJ and the Palestine Journalists’ Syndicate, released its latest statistics on Gaza.

"It put the number at 149 journalists killed - that's the verified number, including Saed Abu Nabhan. Saed was shot dead by an Israeli sniper on January 10 in central Gaza.”

"He was wearing garb that clearly identified him as press, when he was fixed in that IDF sniper's sights,” he said.

The IFJ has confirmed Abu Nabhan was killed by an Israeli sniper, while working in central Gaza's Nuseirat area.

Mr. McDonald said the killing of the freelance photographer was not an isolated incident. He reminded the rally of the deaths of journalists in Gaza and the West Bank prior to the current war.

Huge turnout at solidarity march and rally for Palestine in Derry

“Shireen Abu Akleh, celebrated as the ‘daughter of Palestine’ for her incisive journalism for Al Jazeera was shot dead during an Israeli raid in the Occupied West Bank [in May 2022]. Every investigation since has disproved Israeli claims that she was shot by Palestinian militants and a later revised narrative that she was shot accidentally.

“Gaza's toll of journalists represents an extraordinary rate of attrition, far exceeding the cumulative annual toll of journalists around the globe, who have been killed doing their job,” he said.

Ms. Bor claimed that as hostage and prisoner exchanges commence following the ceasefire ‘there will be an attempt by Israel and western media to reframe Israel as the victim’.

She also hit out at the endorsement by the incoming Taoiseach Micheál Martin of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) non-legally binding working definition of antisemitism after the Tánaiste announced the move as part of ‘Ireland’s longstanding commitment to supporting freedom of religion or belief, equality and non-discrimination’.

"Micheál Martin has announced that one of the first things he is going to do is bring forward the IHRA definition of antisemitism, which in part equates antisemitism with antizionism and we have to say no,” she said.

Ms. Bor noted the IHRA definition was already on the books at Stormont following a motion tabled by the DUP in 2021. The adoption was opposed by Sinn Féin and People Before Profit MLA Gerry Carroll.

"Those Stormont politicians already allowed it to come through. It's the exact definition that is used to undermine the Palestine solidarity movement, used to witch-hunt Jeremy Corbyn and other Palestinian activists over in Britain and it is dangerous,” she claimed.

Mr. McDonald reminded demonstrators how the pandemonium of the past 15 months had been concentrated on just a tiny sliver of land.

“The Gaza strip comprises 365 square kilometres - that's one square kilometre for every day of the year. Derry City & Strabane District combined comprises 1,245 square kilometres - that's three square kilometres for every day of the year.

Hip Hop night in Derry to fundraise donations for support in Palestine

“Gaza is approximately 40 kilometres long. That's the distance from here in the Guildhall to Newtownstewart. In terms of width Gaza ranges roughly from six to 12 kilometres. For comparison that is roughly from here at the Guildhall to Ardmore or from here to Eglinton.

"But here is the real difference in ratio: Derry City & Strabane has a population of roughly 150,000. At the start of this genocidal onslaught by the Israeli army Gaza had a population of two and a quarter million crowded into one third of this space,” he declared.

Mr. Lynch vowed to continue to march and demonstrate in solidarity with his colleagues.

"We march because we have witnessed the slaughter of innocents, we have witnessed the destruction of hospitals and schools. We march to hold the terrorism in Tel Aviv to account and we will keep marching until the occupation ends and Palestine is free,” he said.

17 sombre pictures as Derry children lead candlelight procession for the children and adults of Gaza