Thousands of people – 7,500 according to the Urban Police and 30,000 according to the organizers – demonstrated this Saturday in the center of Barcelona to ask the Government to "immediately" put an end to the arms trade with Israel, which they accuse of perpetrating a crime. genocide in Gaza.
The demonstration, called by the platform 'Enough complicity with Israel' (Enough complicity with Israel) and the Palestinian community of Catalonia, started after 5pm in Plaza Urquinaona to continue along Via Laietana.
A large banner with the slogan "stop the genocide in Gaza, stop the arms trade with Israel" presided over the march, in which Palestinian flags were displayed.
Once the demonstration was over, a large group of protesters entered the França station to hold a rally as a protest against what they consider to be a "genocide" against the Palestinian people. Under a banner that reads 'Palestine Station', protesters shout proclamations such as 'Palestine, Freedom!' or 'Gaza, you are not alone!' and hundreds of people also gather at the entrance to the station.
The organizers of this protest denounce that Israel is "intentionally" bombing residential neighborhoods, hospitals, educational centers, refugee camps, places of worship or ambulances, among other civilian points.
"Israel is carrying out collective punishment against the defenseless and captive population," stressed the spokesperson for the entities calling for this demonstration, Celia Cassenyes, and added: "There is no justification that allows Israel to commit the massacres that it is taking place in Gaza".
This is why they ask the Government to "immediately" suspend the arms trade with Israel. "Seeing that ceasefire demands are being completely ignored by Israel," the entities say, it is necessary for the Government to end the arms trade with this State to "end the genocide in Gaza."
The entities support this claim in the 2007 Spanish law on the control of foreign trade in defense and dual-use material and in the International Treaty on Arms Trade, ratified by Spain in 2014.
According to the organizers of the protest, both texts prohibit the sale of weapons to countries in conflict.
In statements to the media before the start of the demonstration, CUP deputy Carles Riera has asked the Government to paralyze "all diplomatic and commercial relations" of weapons with Israel, because in the face of the "genocide" of the Palestinian people "there is no room for equidistance".
Riera has denounced the death of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank "at the hands of the Israeli army and settlers", a fact that he has described as "apartheid and genocide" of the Palestinian people, and has thus demanded an immediate ceasefire and Israel's compliance with UN resolutions.
"This is not a war by Israel against Hamas, this is a war by Israel against the entire Palestinian people," denounced the CUP deputy.
