\n Tens of thousands of people marched through Barcelona on Saturday in support of Palestinians and demanding an end to arms trade with Israel, one of a series of protests planned across Spain.\n<\/p>\n
\n Marching behind a huge red banner reading: \"Stop the genocide in Palestine. End the arms trade with Israel\", the demonstrators -- who police said numbered 70,000 -- marched peacefully through the city centre.\n<\/p>\n
\n They chanting slogans including \"Boycott Israel\" and \"Free Palestine\".\n<\/p>\n
\n \"Israel's policy has been wrong for many years and we have to take to the streets,\" Marta Carranza, a 65-year-old pensioner demonstrating with a Palestinian flag on her back, told AFP.\n<\/p>\n
\n \"On Thursday, many people came out when the flotilla was intercepted and we expected that today would be serious,\" she added.\n<\/p>\n
\n She was referring to the Global Sumud Flotilla of around 45 vessels seeking to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza.\n<\/p>\n
\n Many of the vessels -- which were heading for the occupied Palestinian territory, where the United Nations says famine has taken hold -- departed from Barcelona in early September.\n<\/p>\n
\n Around 50 Spaniards on the flotilla have been detained by Israel, Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares said told public television in an interview aired on Saturday.\n<\/p>\n
\n The flotilla organisers say Israel's actions were \"illegal\" since they intercepted the vessels while they were traversing international waters.\n<\/p>\n
\n Among the crowd filling the streets of Barcelona was Jordi Bas, a 40-year-old primary school teacher waving a Palestinian flag.\n<\/p>\n
\n - 'People beginning to wake up' -\n<\/p>\n
\n \"It was predictable that many people would turn out today,\" he said. \"People are beginning to wake up a bit.\"\n<\/p>\n
\n \"It's the only thing that can give them (Palestinians) a little encouragement, to see that the whole world is mobilising in solidarity with them,\" he added.\n<\/p>\n
\n More marches were planned for Saturday afternoon in various Spanish cities, including Madrid.\n<\/p>\n
\n On September 14, around 100,000 pro-Palestinian demonstrators forced the halt of the final stage of the Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a cycling race in the Spanish capital, where an Israeli team was competing.\n<\/p>\n
\n Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said Israel should be barred from international sport over the Gaza war, just as Russia was penalised over its invasion of Ukraine.\n<\/p>\n
\n In Europe, Spain is one of the fiercest critics of Israel's military offensive in Gaza, which followed the October 7, 2023, attack in Israel by fighters from Palestinian group Hamas.\n<\/p>\n
\n The Hamas attack resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.\n<\/p>\n
\n Israel's retaliatory offensive on the Gaza Strip has killed at least 66,288 Palestinians, also mostly civilians, according to health ministry figures in the occupied territory that the United Nations considers reliable.\n<\/p>\n
\n In September, Spain said it would ban imports from Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, which have been described by UN rights chief Volker Turk as a war crime.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Tens of thousands of people marched through Barcelona on Saturday in support of Palestinians and demanding an end to arms trade with Israel, one of a series of protests planned across Spain. Marching behind a huge red banner reading: \"Stop the genocide in Palestine. End the arms trade with Israel\", the demonstrators -- who police […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":60,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[553],"tags":[],"ji_location":[],"class_list":["post-150542","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-live-feed"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n