ckaihatsu
12th January 2009, 01:15
[labor_action] London:100,000 march for GAZA --Israel plans attack on IRAN
Sun, Jan 11, 2009 at 5:55 PM
On Saturday, a comrade on the leftist_trainspotters Yahoo Group reported, "huge demo in london today, upwards of 100,000 i would say quite comfortably, sub zero temperatures." Another site, "the Commune," carried a more detailed report about the London mass demo in solidarity with GAZA:
"On Tuesday, the Israeli army shelled a school designated as a refuge from the assault, killing 42 and injuring scores more. Two days later, thirty more civilians were killed as a second refuge was shelled. By Saturday, the number of dead from the past fortnight stood at over 800, with a little under a quarter children. Later that day in West London, cold as it was, and with frost on the ground, around 70,000 people marched against the massacre in Gaza.
"Clashes between police and protesters erupted on a scale not seen for a decade in this country. This is a report by eye-witnesses associated with The Commune, who have also been at many of the demonstrations outside the Embassy over the past fortnight....
"Yesterday shows that many anti-war activists, radical young Muslims in particular, are dissatisfied with the march-and-hope policy of the STWC, SWP and PSC. This generation, angry and sad beyond belief about the murders of imperial war, has exploded onto the streets of Europe in the past week. Oslo has seen its biggest riots in decades, and the following report, from a correspondent in Paris on the demonstration of a week ago, suggests points of similarity between the composition and message of the mobilisations.
"'The demo yesterday was startling. police have revised their original claim of 6,000 to 21,000, but i swear there must’ve been twice that. surprising lack of police presence throughout was explained when we reached place Saint-Augustin, where a quick left would’ve taken us to the Israeli embassy…police fucking everywhere, they’d cut off every road and blocked the entire protest into the place - a ludicrous idea considering the size of the cortege. so now you have around 3,000 disaffected youth already there with at least another 20,000 arriving behind them and police in riot gear everywhere…it kicked off. cars were burned, they smashed up the shops (this is the most affluent, bourgeois part of Paris - Les Galleries Lafayette and all that) and lots of burning of Israeli flags from the top of bus shelters. police moved in … some sort of gas was fired…none of this has made the papers really, just claims that 20 people were arrested after vandalising some cars. I was about the only white person in this parade … [one chant was] “Regarde Francaises, comprennent la verite”…”look Frenchies, understand the truth”'" ....
The report from "the Commune" includes a number of pictures of Saturday's London demo. URL:
http://thecommune.wordpress.com/2009/01/11/mobilisation-and-militancy-in-the-anti-war-movement-photos-and-report-of-10th-january-palestine-demo/#more-1590
* * *
The BBC also reported on Saturday's worldwide solidarity demonstrations for GAZA:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7822222.stm links to a brief BBC
news story, accompanied by an awesome video of the mass demo in
solidarity with GAZA.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7822553.stm links to a narrated BBC video that shows mass demos in solidarity with GAZA, from London, Paris, Bosnia, South Lebanon, the West Bank and Jerusalem in occupied Palestine, Malaysia, and Australia.
* * *
Demonstrations blasting Israel's actions could not be more timely: Sunday afternoon NPR, public radio in the US, reported that Israel had asked the US for permission to fly over Iraq to attack Iran's nuclear facilities and also requested extremely large "bunker-busting" bombs, up to 5,000 pounds, in connection with a future Israeli attack on Iran. According to The New York Times, the US turned Israel down. NPR also reported that the US is seeking to sabotage computers involved with the Iranian nuclear effort, by working with those who supply Iran.
URL: http://www.npr.org/templates/player/mediaPlayer.html?action=1&t=1&islist=false&id=99227800&m=99227795
Sun, Jan 11, 2009 at 5:55 PM
On Saturday, a comrade on the leftist_trainspotters Yahoo Group reported, "huge demo in london today, upwards of 100,000 i would say quite comfortably, sub zero temperatures." Another site, "the Commune," carried a more detailed report about the London mass demo in solidarity with GAZA:
"On Tuesday, the Israeli army shelled a school designated as a refuge from the assault, killing 42 and injuring scores more. Two days later, thirty more civilians were killed as a second refuge was shelled. By Saturday, the number of dead from the past fortnight stood at over 800, with a little under a quarter children. Later that day in West London, cold as it was, and with frost on the ground, around 70,000 people marched against the massacre in Gaza.
"Clashes between police and protesters erupted on a scale not seen for a decade in this country. This is a report by eye-witnesses associated with The Commune, who have also been at many of the demonstrations outside the Embassy over the past fortnight....
"Yesterday shows that many anti-war activists, radical young Muslims in particular, are dissatisfied with the march-and-hope policy of the STWC, SWP and PSC. This generation, angry and sad beyond belief about the murders of imperial war, has exploded onto the streets of Europe in the past week. Oslo has seen its biggest riots in decades, and the following report, from a correspondent in Paris on the demonstration of a week ago, suggests points of similarity between the composition and message of the mobilisations.
"'The demo yesterday was startling. police have revised their original claim of 6,000 to 21,000, but i swear there must’ve been twice that. surprising lack of police presence throughout was explained when we reached place Saint-Augustin, where a quick left would’ve taken us to the Israeli embassy…police fucking everywhere, they’d cut off every road and blocked the entire protest into the place - a ludicrous idea considering the size of the cortege. so now you have around 3,000 disaffected youth already there with at least another 20,000 arriving behind them and police in riot gear everywhere…it kicked off. cars were burned, they smashed up the shops (this is the most affluent, bourgeois part of Paris - Les Galleries Lafayette and all that) and lots of burning of Israeli flags from the top of bus shelters. police moved in … some sort of gas was fired…none of this has made the papers really, just claims that 20 people were arrested after vandalising some cars. I was about the only white person in this parade … [one chant was] “Regarde Francaises, comprennent la verite”…”look Frenchies, understand the truth”'" ....
The report from "the Commune" includes a number of pictures of Saturday's London demo. URL:
http://thecommune.wordpress.com/2009/01/11/mobilisation-and-militancy-in-the-anti-war-movement-photos-and-report-of-10th-january-palestine-demo/#more-1590
* * *
The BBC also reported on Saturday's worldwide solidarity demonstrations for GAZA:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7822222.stm links to a brief BBC
news story, accompanied by an awesome video of the mass demo in
solidarity with GAZA.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7822553.stm links to a narrated BBC video that shows mass demos in solidarity with GAZA, from London, Paris, Bosnia, South Lebanon, the West Bank and Jerusalem in occupied Palestine, Malaysia, and Australia.
* * *
Demonstrations blasting Israel's actions could not be more timely: Sunday afternoon NPR, public radio in the US, reported that Israel had asked the US for permission to fly over Iraq to attack Iran's nuclear facilities and also requested extremely large "bunker-busting" bombs, up to 5,000 pounds, in connection with a future Israeli attack on Iran. According to The New York Times, the US turned Israel down. NPR also reported that the US is seeking to sabotage computers involved with the Iranian nuclear effort, by working with those who supply Iran.
URL: http://www.npr.org/templates/player/mediaPlayer.html?action=1&t=1&islist=false&id=99227800&m=99227795