Hundreds gather for Pro Palestine protests in Hyderabad

Hyderabad: Hundreds of people gathered in Hyderabad at Dharna Chowk in protest on Sunday, October 5, against the ongoing killings of innocent civilians by Israel in Gaza. The protesters demanding that the Indian government immediately sever all diplomatic and trade relations with Israel.

The protest in Hyderabad is part of a nationwide agitation that is being also held in major cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chandigarh, Vijayawada and other cities. The gathering saw activists, intellectuals, doctors, students and young adults as well, who came out in large numbers to participate in the protest.

Shouting slogans against Israel, the protesters expressed their solidarity with the Palestinian people, especially in Gaza, thousands of whom have been facing one of the worst onslaughts by the Israeli military since 2023. Gaza has been under attack since after Hamas-led militants stormed into Israel on October 7, 2023, attacking army bases, farming communities and an outdoor music festival, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians.

They abducted 251 others, most of them since released in ceasefires or other deals. Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed more than 66,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not say how many were civilians or combatants. It says women and children make up around half the dead. The offensive has displaced around 90 per cent of Gaza’s population and left much of the territory uninhabitable.

An estimated 400,000 people have fled the city in recent weeks, but hundreds of thousands more have stayed behind.

On Sunday, the protesters shouted slogans condemning Israel and sung revolutionary songs and poetry. Some of the protesters also distributed pamphlets explaining the history of the Israel-Palestine conflict. Speaking on behalf of the organizers, Anand of the ‘Indian People in Solidarity with Palestine’ stressed that the Palestine issue is not a religious issue, but a humanitarian issue.

According to a press release, Anand stated that Israel is a settler colonial apartheid state that has occupied Palestinian land and has been committing ethnic cleansing since 1948. “This is one of the worst occupations in the history of colonialism. We Indians have been subjected to colonialism for over 200 years. Therefore, we naturally demand that we stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people,” he added.

Speaking on behalf of BDS India, Sreeja said that the international movement called BDS – Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions – is being carried out in various parts of the world with the aim of diplomatic, commercial, educational and cultural boycott against Israel’s colonial and apartheid policies.

In recent days, protests have also been held in front of Indian outlets and multinational companies like Tata, Reliance, Mahindra, McDonald’s, Adidas, which activists say are contributing to the genocide in Gaza. She called for a boycott of the products of these companies as a sign of protest against the massacre in Gaza.