At least 70,000 people demand an end to the genocide at the largest Palestinian demonstration in Barcelona.

BarcelonaThis Saturday, Barcelona hosted the largest demonstration for Palestine ever held in the city. According to the Guardia Urbana (Urban Guard), 70,000 people, and according to the organizers, 300,000, filled the streets of Barcelona to demand an end to the genocide in Gaza. The march began at 12 noon at the intersection of Passeig de Gràcia and Diagonal, and as it began to advance along Passeig de Gràcia, the sheer scale of the protest became evident, with columns arriving from other neighborhoods joining in. "Welcome to the largest demonstration in history for Palestine," one of the organizers called out from the vehicle leading the way.

The head of the demonstration advanced with a large banner that read "We stopped the genocide in Palestine. Enough of the arms trade." Some 650 organizations calling for "an end to the genocide in Palestine, a comprehensive arms embargo, a severing of relations, and an end to the association agreement between the EU and Israel" joined the protest. In the afternoon, a second demonstration brought together hundreds of protesters in the center of Barcelona.

The president of the Palestinian Community of Catalonia, Natalia Abu Sharar, attacked the peace plan proposed by Donald Trump, which she described as "another cover-up for the continuation of the genocide" by Israel. "This agreement was made without speaking to the Palestinians, without taking into account the rights of the Palestinians, and without speaking to Palestine," she asserted. Abu Sharar called for "continuing to take to the streets" and "not normalizing colonization, apartheid, and the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people." She asserted that "Gaza is currently a death camp," while in the West Bank, "the construction of illegal settlements on Palestinian land continues." "This is not normal. Israel is acting with total impunity," he emphasized.

About an hour and a half after the start, the head of the march advanced through Plaça Urquinaona, and protesters occupied the entire Passeig de Gràcia to the intersection with Avinguda Diagonal, where it had begun. Around 2:00 p.m., the head of the march reached the Arc de Triomf, the final point of the route, where a central event was held with the reading of manifestos and Palestinian music. The protest spilled into the streets of the center of the Catalan capital, and municipal sources admitted that it was difficult to quantify all the points where traffic had been blocked beyond Passeig de Gràcia.

Alys Samson Estapé, a member of the Enough Complicity with Israel coalition, which co-organized Saturday's massive march to Barcelona, ​​​​called today "a historic day" that will demonstrate that "Catalonia stands with Palestine" and that will show "the urgent need to isolate Israel and to isolate Israel.

The organization has called on the European Union (EU) to "end all relations" with the state of Israel and on the Spanish government to "impose a comprehensive arms embargo now." It also asked the Spanish government not to support Donald Trump's plan, which she described as "anything but a peace plan," because she sees it as a "colonial plan." She has demanded that the Generalitat also "end relations with Israel," and that Barcelona City Council "ensure that there are no more Israeli pavilions at the Fira de Barcelona and that there are no more complicit companies that profit from it." genocide".

During the demonstration there was a false alarm at the Bershka store when someone reported that there was a firearm. According to sources from the Mossos d'Esquadra, it was the pistol of an undercover national police officer who was on duty. The officer did not draw his weapon at any time, the same sources claim, but someone saw he was carrying it, became alarmed and there was a commotion.

Taxi drivers, unions, political parties, journalists and other groups

A slow taxi march joined the demonstration and opened the protest. The drivers left Plaça Espanya at approximately 11:00 a.m. and joined the demonstration at the intersection of Passeig de Gràcia and Gran Via. Behind them, the demonstration was organized by sector: first, pro-Palestinian organizations, followed by unions, and finally by political parties.

Among the many sectors and organizations that joined the Barcelona march were also journalists, who in addition to denouncing the genocide perpetrated by Israel also condemned the murder of more than 250 colleagues in the Gaza Strip since the beginning of the war two years ago. They carried signs with images of some of these murdered journalists and T-shirts with the slogan Journalism against genocide in Palestine, the group insists on demanding that Israel stop killing journalists and allow the international press into Gaza.