Palestinians continue protests over Jerusalem
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Foreign activists from several international solidarity movements joined the demonstration, where demonstrators waved Palestinian flags and chanted slogans against Israel.
Saleh Zeidan, member of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP), who participated in the protest, told reporters "this demonstration was arranged to reiterate that this territory is completely a Palestinian territory."
![A Palestinian protester hurls stones at Israeli soldiers during clashes at Qalandiya checkpoint near the West Bank city of Ramallah on March 17, 2010. Clashes erupted to protest against Israeli consecrating a synagogue in the old city of Jerusalem. .[Mamoun Wazwaz/Xinhua]](http://images.china.cn/attachement/jpg/site1007/20100318/000cf1bdd03f0d0bc58f0a.jpg "A Palestinian protester hurls stones at Israeli soldiers during clashes at Qalandiya checkpoint near the West Bank city of Ramallah on March 17, 2010. Clashes erupted to protest against Israeli consecrating a synagogue in the old city of Jerusalem. .[Mamoun Wazwaz/Xinhua]") |
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A Palestinian protester hurls stones at Israeli soldiers during clashes at Qalandiya checkpoint near the West Bank city of Ramallah on March 17, 2010. Clashes erupted to protest against Israeli consecrating a synagogue in the old city of Jerusalem. .[Mamoun Wazwaz/Xinhua] |
He accused Israel of trying to annex parts of the Gaza Strip area to its territories, adding "the Palestinians won't stop their protests until Israel decides to close these zones in the Gaza Strip."
"The West Bank, the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem are one united Palestinian territory that was occupied by Israel in 1967 and should be completely liberated," said Zeidan.
On Tuesday, dozens of Palestinians demonstrated near the borders between northern Gaza Strip and Israel, during which Israeli army forces opened intensive warning fire, and the demonstration was peacefully dispersed with no injuries.
Meanwhile, Abbas on Wednesday called on Israel to stop building Jewish settlements in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, in order to start U.S.-led proximity talks between the two sides, which were backed by the Arab League.
Israel's approval last week of building 1,600 homes in the eastern section of Jerusalem, which the Palestinians want as a capital for their future state, delayed the re-launch of the indirect negotiations after the Arabs and Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) accepted the U.S. proposal.
Speaking to reporters in a joint news conference with Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva on Wednesday in Ramallah, Abbas urged his rival Hamas movement to accept an Egyptian proposal for Palestinian national reconciliation, a matter which would help lifting the Israeli blockade.
Hamas took over Gaza after routing pro-Abbas forces in deadly fighting in 2007. Currently, the Palestinian National Authority ( PNA) holds sway in parts of the West Bank.
Both Abbas and Lula called for an end to the blockade Israel imposed on the Gaza Strip.
Abbas basically opposes resolving the conflict with Israel by violence, but insists that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict can be only resolved through peace negotiations.
"The siege on Gaza must be lifted" and the barrier Israel is building in the West Bank "must fall," Lula said. He added that Brazil takes part in international efforts to rebuild Gaza following the end of a three-week Israeli war there in January 2009.
