Gaza: Great Return March Protests to Continue until End of Blockade

Local Editor

Co-founder of Hamas resistance movement Mahmoud al-Zahar said Palestinians will continue the Great March of Return rallies until the end of the “Israeli” siege on the Gaza Strip.

Al-Zahar made the remarks in a Sunday interview with Al-Alam News Network in the Iranian capital.

He said the anti-occupation rallies, known as the “Great March of Return," have produced important results, and will not be stopped before the “Israeli” regime’s siege on the enclave is lifted.

Tensions have been running high near the fence separating Gaza from the occupied territories since March 30, which marked the start of the protests.

Palestinian protesters demand the right to return for those driven out of their homeland.

The confrontations in Gaza reached their peak on May 14, the eve of the 70th anniversary of Nakba Day, or the Day of Catastrophe, which coincided this year with Washington's relocation of the US embassy from Tel Aviv to occupied al-Quds.

More than 220 Palestinians have so far been martyred and over 20,000 others wounded in the renewed Gaza clashes, according to the latest figures released by the Gaza Health Ministry.

Gaza has been under Zionist siege since June 2007, causing a decline in living standards as well as unprecedented unemployment and poverty.

Relatively, Hamas’ military wings warned in a joint statement on Sunday that the coming Friday will be “decisive” in determining their response to the killing of four people during recent border protests.

They declared they had prepared retaliation steps, and that their use will be dependent upon “Israel’s” occupation policy.

It will be “a decisive day in examining the Zionist enemy’s behavior and intentions toward our people in the March of Return,” the Sunday statement said.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team