Over 50 injured as Israeli forces use live fire to disperse Gaza protesters

Rasa - More than 50 Palestinians have been injured by Israeli gunfire and tear gas at the border of the besieged Gaza Strip with the occupied territories, as a fresh round of protest rallies drew several thousand Palestinian demonstrators to the flashpoint frontier.

News ID: 440804

Date: 03 October 2018 - 11:17

RNA - According to the Palestinian Ma'an news agency, clashes erupted on Monday after thousands of protesters gathered near sea port in the northern Gaza Strip to challenge the years-long Israeli siege on the coastal enclave.

The Tel Aviv regime’s troops used live ammunition and fired teargas canisters to disperse the protesters.

Local sources said that at least 51 Palestinians were injured, including some 10 by Israeli live fire. Dozens more suffered from tear gas inhalation.

The latest clash comes after seven people lost their lives by Israeli live fire during multiple protests held across the Gaza Strip on Friday evening. Another 506 protesters were also injured.

Meanwhile, Gaza’s national Committee for Breaking the Siege, which organized the march, said that it would launch further such rallies until Israel overturned the blockade of the Palestinian enclave.

The Gaza Strip has been under a crippling Israeli siege since 2007, which has prevented some two million Palestinians from having free access to the remainder of Palestine and the outside world. The blockade has also undermined living conditions in the coastal enclave and fragmented its economic and social fabric.

Over the past few years, Israeli forces have conducted more than a hundred assaults on Palestinian boats that the Tel Aviv regime says seek to violate the blockade, detaining dozens of fishermen and confiscating several boats. According to Israeli human rights group, B’Tselem, Israel’s Gaza siege and “harassment of fishermen” have been “destroying Gaza’s fishing sector,” with 95 percent of fishermen living below the poverty line.

The Tel Aviv regime carries out regular attacks on Gaza inhabitants under the pretext of hitting positions belonging to the Hamas resistance movement, which governs the territory.

According to Press TV, the coastal sliver has also witnessed a fresh wave of deadly tensions since March 30, which marked the start of a series of protests demanding the right to return for the Palestinians driven out of their homeland.

More than 190 Palestinians have so far been killed and over 20,000 others wounded in the renewed Gaza clashes, according to the latest figures released by the Gaza Health Ministry.

The Gaza Strip and the occupied territories have been the scene of new tensions ever since US President Donald Trump on December 6, 2017 declared Washington’s recognition of Jerusalem al-Quds as Israel’s “capital” and promised that the US would move its diplomatic mission to the city.

In the hours leading up to the inauguration of the US embassy in Jerusalem al-Quds on May 14, Israeli troops engaged in clashes with Palestinian protesters, killing over 60 unarmed demonstrators and wounding more than 2,700 others, either through direct shooting or firing tear gas canisters.

847/940