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Gazans protest Bush visit
08/01/2008 18:07 - (SA)
Gaza City - Hundreds of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip protested the upcoming visit of US President George W. Bush on Tuesday while demanding international pressure on Israel to end a months-old siege.
Protesters waved large pictures of Bush and Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert with the word "Terrorist" written under them.
The increasingly isolated Gaza Strip has since mid-June been ruled by the Islamist Hamas movement - considered a terrorist group in Israel and the West - and has been cut off from the renewed peace process.
Since Hamas gunmen routed security forces loyal to Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas last summer, the US and Israel have headed an international effort to isolate the Islamists while bolstering Abbas.
Included among the demonstrators were around a hundred Gazans confined to wheelchairs, rolling down the potholed streets of the city to protest Israeli border closures, which have cut the territory off from all but vital goods.
"Help Gaza or you condemn it to a slow death," one sign said. "We are killed by American weapons and we are beseiged because of American decision," read another.
"We are calling on the international community and the US administration to adhere to international law and put pressure on Israel to open the crossings," said Abdel Majid al-Aalul, head of a Hamas-linked charity.
Palestinians and international human rights groups have said the closures amount to "collective punishment" and have caused several deaths by preventing sick Gazans from leaving for medical care, charges Israel has denied.
Hamas has repeatedly protested Bush's visit, claiming it will only strengthen Israel and deepen the bitter divisions among Palestinians.
- AFP
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