No. 5

January 13, 2024

Photo Review January 1 to 12

Worldwide Actions Demanding
Ceasefire Now! Increase

Sana'a, Yemen, January 12

CANADA

Ottawa

Several hundred people gathered for the 13th consecutive weekend march for Gaza on January 7, on Parliament Hill, on the 92nd day of the brutal aggression and genocide against the Palestinian people.

Before the march, a Palestinian-Canadian pediatrician was invited to say a few words about his immediate experience of having been to Gaza, where his father and other family members were recently killed. His father, who was born in Gaza in 1945 -- a few years before the Nakba -- was forced to leave his land and spent his childhood in a refugee camp, without proper education or access to a health care system. When he visited his father, the family was forced to leave their home which had been targeted and destroyed. They travelled by foot from the north to the south of Gaza, under attack and in the most horrible circumstances. His last memory of his father is of an 80-year-old man who stood in front of him, crying, saying that he had started his life in a refugee camp and that, once again, he was forced to leave his house, something he has had to do throughout his entire life, to maintain his human dignity.

Organizers called on everyone to keep talking about Palestine and to do all in their power to stop the genocide as soon as possible. They pointed out that the terrorist state of Israel has expanded its attacks to Lebanon and Syria, and that, if it is not stopped, it will continue on its path of destruction. They called on everyone to step up the struggle, including the fight for Israel to face the International Court of Justice for the crimes against humanity it has committed and for Netanyahu to be thrown in jail.

City of Ottawa's Attempts to Quash Just Support for Palestine

Starting at the December 23, 2023 "No Christmas as Usual" demonstration and continuing to the most recent action on January 7 in solidarity with the Palestinian people, the City of Ottawa has been issuing $490 tickets to participants for use of megaphones or sound systems.

It is clear to everyone, especially long-time activists, that this is an unprecedented and expressly political act by the city that targets supporters of Palestine. One of the main demands of the demonstrations is for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza which, unlike other municipalities across the country, Ottawa's city council and mayor have not supported. There are broad calls for the city to drop the fines.

In a statement after the December 23 action, the Palestinian Youth Movement and Labour for Palestine said:

"City Bylaw Officers and the Ottawa Police enforced an obscure bylaw in an attempt to silence and intimidate us into inaction. Despite 10 weeks of protests using the same sound systems, Ottawa bylaw officers issued fines against organizers and community members using any sound system or megaphone moments into our No Christmas as Usual protest on December 23. Despite this, we continued to chant and march, refusing to be silenced. We, along with several organizations and allies, will be pushing back against this repression."

At the December 30, 2023 demonstration tickets totalling close to $4,500 were handed out to organizers and participants.

The Association of Palestinian Arab Canadians issued the following statement on December 27, 2023:

"The Association of Palestinian Arab Canadians (APAC) is strongly opposed to the City of Ottawa's decision to fine protesters for the use of sound amplification devices at a December 23 protest and calls on the City to cancel these tickets.

"Tens of thousands of Canadians have been gathering for 10 weeks in a row in Ottawa to express their solidarity with the Palestinian people and to urge our government to push for a permanent ceasefire and an end to the blockade of Gaza.

"As we approach the third month of Israel's war on the Palestinian people, our appeals for ceasefire are as urgent as ever. Israel continues to murder children at the rate of one child every ten minutes. The death toll has surged past 20,000 Palestinians killed by Israel and there are no signs that this genocide is coming to an end.

"The humanitarian situation according to the world's most reputable human rights organizations and the United Nations (UN) is catastrophic and grows more dire as each moment passes as the lack of food, clean water, medical supplies and life's basic necessities are denied to Palestinians.

"Against this backdrop, APAC renews our commitment to peaceful protest and to continue to pressure our elected officials through all legal means. We will not be deterred by the City of Ottawa's efforts to silence calls for a ceasefire and respect for human rights by issuing these fines.

"We are deeply concerned by the City of Ottawa's selective enforcement of this noise ordinance. APAC and numerous allies have exercised our legal right to peaceful assembly for 10 weeks in a row with the use of amplification systems. The City did not enforce this noise ordinance at any of the previous protests. The change in approach has left us perplexed. The City offered no advance notice of the change in approach and no explanation since.

"Regardless of the motivations, APAC strongly opposes any decision to prevent the use of sound amplification systems at protests aimed at demanding our government push for a ceasefire, as these fundamentally cripple our ability to communicate with our supporters.

"It is a shocking double standard that the City of Ottawa, under the leadership of Mayor Mark Sutcliffe, chose to bathe City Hall in blue and white after close to 1,200 Israelis were killed on October 7 but refused to do the same for Palestinians even though almost 20 times the number of Palestinians have been brutally murdered since October 7.

"It is shameful that the City of Ottawa would choose to silence protesters calling for a ceasefire and appealing for human rights at a time when UN experts are warning the world that a genocide is unfolding in front of our very eyes.

"We call on the City of Ottawa to cancel these tickets and refrain from further enforcement of this noise ordinance."

Iqaluit

January 6, march to legislature

Halifax

About 100 people gathered in Halifax on January 6 in solidarity with the Palestinian people. Speakers included Independent Jewish Voices, and several Mi'kmaq who performed the Strong Woman Song and the land acknowledgement.

Montreal

Hundreds of people gathered in Old Montreal on the evening of January 9 to pay tribute to more than 110 journalists, mostly Palestinian, targeted since October 7 and murdered for having exposed, through their reporting, the genocide orchestrated by Israel against the people of Gaza and the Palestinian people as a whole.

As a young woman from the Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM) said to the crowd in her introductory remarks, the murdered journalists' "commitment to truth, justice and liberation serves as an inspiration for our movement and for the world. During the onslaught of news about the genocide in Gaza, with never-ending reports of displacement, obliteration, and, of course, death, it's easy for us to feel overwhelmed by hopelessness and despair. But right now, more than ever, our actions must remain resolute. We as a people have to remain steadfast in our commitment to the liberation of Palestine, especially so that the bloodshed and the sacrifices that our brothers and sisters have made are not in vain and that they are never forgotten." She added, "If you are perhaps newer to the movement and you're only just starting to learn about the history of the occupation, what you may not know is that the Zionist regime has been using this barbaric tactic since long before the beginning of the assault on Gaza in 2023."

"Shareen Abu Akleh, a distinguished reporter for Al Jazeera and a household name among Arabs, was killed in broad daylight by the Israeli occupation forces [on May 11, 2022] as she was wearing a visible blue vest with the word ‘PRESS' very clearly and largely marked across it. The year before that, Israel carried out an air raid on a tower in Gaza, which housed multiple media offices, including [...] Al Jazeera. In 2018, Yasir Murtaza, a photojournalist from Gaza, was shot dead by an Israeli sniper. His crime was photographing protests that were happening on the southern Gaza border. Like Shareen Abu Akleh, he was also wearing a marked press vest as well as a helmet. The examples that I've given you here are a small fraction of the journalists that Israel has strategically targeted since 1948."

"Palestinian journalists offer a window into a world that is otherwise isolated from us, both metaphorically and literally isolated from us so we can understand why then, Israel deliberately targets these journalists. Their existence and their stories shake the very foundation of the Zionist narrative. While Palestinian journalists have been risking their lives every single day to showcase to the world the brutality of Israel's genocidal campaign, Canadian news networks have been shamefully complicit. The language that Canadian media uses grossly minimizes the war crimes committed by Israel, which in the end, further dehumanizes Palestinians. These networks have repeatedly chosen not to report the horrors and the violence that confronts the people of Palestine."

"It does not extend to holding the Zionist state accountable for its crimes against humanity. For that, Palestinian journalists have paid the ultimate price. So tonight we are here to honour the ones who have been killed since October 7 for their courage, their fearlessness, and their unwavering commitment to showing the world the true face of Israel. But most importantly, we are here to draw from their courage so that we can be ever more devoted to the movement and can continue to carry the torch in their honour, no matter where we are."

Ellen Gabriel, a Haudenosaunee land defender from Kanasatake then came to speak to the crowd assembled for the vigil. Amongst other things, she said, "The crimes that we are seeing happening are outrageous in this lifetime. As the South African lawyer said today, the scale and the magnitude of the destruction and the genocide that we see happening in Gaza is unprecedented. In recent times, I've seen the call for Canada to support the South African case against Israel on genocide. And I say to Justin Trudeau and to Marc Miller, who was Indian affairs minister, Canada has a long history of genocide against Indigenous Peoples. It's time for Canada to stop being complicit in genocide and actually be on the right side and actually stop a genocide. They have the capabilities to lobby other countries' governments." She added that "South Africa would not have been able to do what they're doing had it not been for the brave journalists of Gaza."

A young woman, a spokesperson for the PYM, said to the crowd: "This weekend, we will have officially reached 100 days of genocide. And this takes me back to the first couple of weeks of October when the entire world was mobilized. Enraged, distraught, eyes glued to our screens, unable to fathom the scale of violence and bloodshed that we were witnessing. And we couldn't imagine that this would keep going for as long as it has in these 100 days. We've also learned what it means to be a hero. We've seen journalists like Wael al-Dahdouh learn about his wife and children getting killed in a targeted Israeli air strike, live on air and remain firm and unbreakable. We've seen him lose almost every single one of his children, his grandchildren. We've seen him report on the destruction of his land with a steadfastness that only comes with a certainty in your conviction and a belief that your land and your people will be liberated."

"We are not just here to mourn. We're here because our martyrs embolden us to be braver. They inspire us to make bigger sacrifices for the movement, to ensure that as long as we are witnesses to these atrocities, we will not just be passive watchers of history, but we will be active agents in history, and we will mobilize against those responsible for these war crimes."

"In the history of our struggle, funerals have never just been a morbid event. They have never been just a place for us to mourn those that we've lost. They've always been more than that. Our funerals are also moments of revolution. When a hero is martyred, thousands take to the streets in protests. When a hero is martyred, thousands of ordinary people rise up to be heroes as well. When Shireen Abu Akleh's funeral was happening, thousands took to the streets. And we need to keep this legacy alive. [...]

"So even though we are gathering to remember those we've lost, we're also here to send a message to the occupation. We have something that none of your sophisticated tanks and missiles can ever defeat. We have a just cause that we are willing to sacrifice, fight and die for. And the children that you have orphaned will grow up to confront the occupation. The mothers that you have widowed will instill a culture of sacrifice in their homes. The fathers who have watched bloodlines get destroyed will rebuild the land. And we, the movement in the diaspora, the people who you thought you could disperse across the world, we are in the belly of the beast and we will strike where it hurts most."

"This genocide has changed us all and it's changed the entire world with it. And that's good. This genocide will forever remain a stain in the historical records of the world. And as people of conscience, our genuine resentments of imperialism must only grow. And our genuine love for people, for good, for justice, must be nurtured. And this will only be nurtured through community, through sacrifice and through organization. We may be against an empire that seems indestructible, immoral and unbreakable. But the empire is against a people, not just in Palestine, but across the world, that will never abandon the fight for liberation. And what the brave people of Gaza have taught us is that even under a land, sea and air blockade, even under the toughest conditions, even the world's largest open air prison can be broken."

"We've seen what the most powerful politicians have made of this world. But most importantly, the people in Gaza have given us the ability to not just imagine a world where these leaders are held accountable, they have given us the bravery necessary to fight for this world. And I know that we will fight for this just world together, until liberation and return."

McGill University student journalists from The McGill Daily then addressed the crowd. They mentioned the fact that targeting journalists is a war crime, and it is unacceptable that Israel, backed by the U.S. and Canada, has been allowed to do so with such impunity for 75 years [before the current bombardment of Gaza for almost 100 days]. In this, the Canadian government and McGill University are complicit. "We call on the leaders of governments and institutions to condemn the killing of journalists and take concrete action to hold Israel accountable, such as calling for an immediate ceasefire, imposing an arms embargo on Israel, and supporting South Africa's genocide case at the International Court of Justice. And for McGill University, as students, we demand that they condemn this genocide and that they divest and cut ties with all corporations and donors who are also complicit in these atrocities."

During the entire vigil and at intervals, a young Palestinian woman read out the names of the more than 110 journalists targeted and killed by Israeli military forces since October 7, while their names were projected on the wall of a building adjacent to where people were assembled. As each of the journalists’ names was read out, the crowd was invited to repeat that name. The vigil ended with a call to participate in the January 14 weekly march in support of Palestine that will also mark 100 days of the Israeli genocide against the people of Gaza.

January 9 vigil

January 6

Toronto

On January 4 about two hundred people gathered in front of Union Station to amplify the calls for the Canadian government to take a stand for justice for Palestinians, work for a ceasefire and end all funding to the Israeli Zionist regime. For two hours people shouted slogans condemning the Israeli genocidal attacks on Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank and against the U.S. and Canadian leaders who support Israel's crimes.

Many passers-by joined in or took a statement from the organizers which explained the reason for the action -- "We are a coalition of Jews who demand a ceasefire in Gaza, an end to Israeli apartheid, and that Canada stop arming Israel through military trade. ...We reject the conflation of Zionism with Judaism. We refuse the racist narratives of anti-Palestinian dehumanization that aim to justify violence, and we challenge the myth of Israeli 'self-defence.' We demand a FREE PALESTINE."

Organizers called on everyone to step up the actions in Canada in support of the Palestinian resistance and to continue to put pressure on the Trudeau government to stop arming Israel and demand a ceasefire NOW!

People in the Greater Toronto Area organized multiple actions January 6 and 7 in support of the struggle of the Palestinian people to put an end to the siege of Gaza and to the occupation. People gathered with flags, banners and placards on January 6 at more than 20 major highway overpasses around the city and the surrounding area where they could be seen for a great distance by passing vehicles. Hundreds of motorists showed their support by flashing lights, honking horns, raising fists and giving peace signs.

On January 7 thousands gathered at Union Station in Toronto and marched to City Hall, chanting slogans and stopping along the way for speeches. Speaker after speaker called on everyone to put pressure on Prime Minister Trudeau, Cabinet Ministers and their own Members of Parliament to demand that Canada take a stand for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and that Canada support South Africa's case at the International Court of Justice accusing Israel of genocide.

Several speakers recounted the conditions in Gaza, the relentless assault of the Israeli armed forces, the heroism of doctors, nurses, ambulance drivers, journalists and aid workers, and the resilience and determination of the Palestinian people. A doctor, one of a team of six Canadian and U.S. doctors who had recently returned from Gaza, hailed the heroism of Palestinian doctors and medical personnel in Gaza who have lost their homes and loved ones and continue to stay in the hospitals to treat patients. He said that half of the patients he treated in a hospital in Khan Younis were children and that many patients are dying for lack of medical supplies. He brought a message of gratitude from the people of Gaza for the support of the peoples of Canada and the U.S. for their fight for freedom and urged everyone at the demonstration to step up the pressure on Canadian officials to support a ceasefire through phone calls, emails, petitions and meetings.