The Palestinian Great March of Return have entered their fourth week and continued unabated despite violent attack from Israeli military forces. The media and Australian government (including the opposition) is determined to see these events as “deadly unrest”. It’s clear however that the violence comes from Israeli forces upholding their colonial power and defending apartheid state from a largely peaceful mass movement.
The protest was explicitly planned to be a large, non-violent demonstration. Organisers planned their march to stay away from the Israeli forces, and the border. Organisers told Ha’aretz their goal was “to present the Palestinians’ case to the world and not to engage in confrontations with the Israeli army.”
Israel responded with brute force. The army shot on camera isolated and unarmed Palestinians hundreds of metres from their soldiers, posing no threat. All who get within 300 yards are labelled “instigators” by the Israeli army, whose soldiers have orders to shoot them. The sheer scale of the casualties on the first day of the protest is striking, with as many as 16 killed and 1,415 injured, of whom 758 were hit by live fire according to Gaza health officials.
Read the rest of Imogen Grant’s president’s report at Honi Soit.
[There is a report in the same vein from the Education Officers Lara Sonnenschein and Lily Campbell to be found at the same place on Honi Soit.]