Pro-Palestinian demonstrators across the globe took to the streets on Saturday to call for a ceasefire after Israel expanded its ground operation in Gaza.
Major world cities, including London, Istanbul, New York, Baghdad and Rome, saw their centers filled with protestors, as Gaza experienced an intense bombardment and an electrical and communications blackout.
Israel has announced the next stage of its war against Hamas is underway, after the militant group killed 1,400 people and took hostages in a surprise attack on October 7.
In London, organizers said hundreds of thousands of demonstrators showed up on Saturday, as police estimated the number was between 50,000 and 70,000 people.
In videos online, marchers who had taken over central London were heard chanting: “What do we want? Ceasefire. When do we want it? Now.”
Protesters say they want a ceasefire and peace for people of Gaza.
They lamented that over the last few days, couple of weeks, they have watched so many babies and children dying.
Police temporarily shut down all lanes of the Brooklyn Bridge in Manhattan on Saturday after a large group of demonstrators rallying in support of Palestinians started heading in that direction.
The demonstration, titled in an Instagram post as “Flood Brooklyn for Gaza,” started at Brooklyn Museum at 3 p.m., continued up to the front of Barclays Center at 4 p.m. and ended at the Brooklyn Bridge.
Both UK Prime Minister RISHI SUNAK and US President JOE BIDEN have supported Israel’s right to defend itself.
President BIDEM, on the day of the Hamas attack, called his support of Israel’s security “rock solid and unwavering.”
European Union leaders have stopped short of calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, instead appealing for humanitarian “On Saturday, Turkish President RECEPTION TAYYIP ERDOGAN told a crowd of Palestinian supporters in Istanbul that they should leave the rally “with the determination to never allow new Gazas.
Erdogan had said on Thursday that attacks on Gaza “have long passed the point of being self-defense,” adding, “It is now oppression, atrocity, massacre and barbaric.”
More than 2 million people live in the densely populated enclave, where people have faced intense Israeli airstrikes and a growing humanitarian situation, with shortages of water, food and fuel. Half of Gaza’s population are children.
At least 7,950 people have been killed and more than 20,000 others injured in Israeli attacks on Gaza since October 7, according to the latest figures released by the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Ramallah, which draws from sources in the Hamas-controlled enclave.