Large gathering for 35th Cork city rally in solidarity with Palestinians

Crowds gathered in Cork city on Saturday afternoon for the 36th rally in solidarity with Palestinians, organised by Cork Palestine Solidarity Campaign.

The rally began on a solemn note, as approximately 15 organisers dressed in hazmat suits with blindfolds on and their hands tied behind their backs, representing Palestinian abductees, took to the stage on Grand Parade and knelt in silence.

Cork Palestine Solidarity Campaign committee member and MC, Latif Midoume, addressed the crowd to highlight what abducted Palestinians in Israeli jails have been experiencing.

“Several survivors have had limbs amputated because the restraints used by camp guards were so tight,” he said.

Struggle

The crowd also heard from Belfast native and former political prisoner Ciaran Dawson, who compared political prisoners’ experiences in Palestine with the struggle of the H Block prisoners of the 1970s.

“Prison struggle has always been at the core of any liberation struggle in that the oppressor will use every weapon at their disposal to crush the imprisoned and that the prisoners will resist with every fibre of their being, namely their own bodies and minds,” Mr Dawson said.

Co-chair of Cork Palestine Solidarity Campaign Kathy Glavanis spoke to the crowd about the families in the West Bank and Gaza still waiting for their relatives’ bodies.

After the march around the city, the crowd returned to the Grand Parade to hear from student activist Caoimhe Lyons of the UCC BDS encampment and to listen to a rendition of Martin Leahy’s anthem ‘Palestine’.