Jordanians Stage Mass Rally on Eve of ‘Great March of Return’ Anniversary

According to Arabic-language Palestine al-Yawm news agency, they marched through a street in Amman following Friday prayers.

Carrying banners and placards, the demonstrators chanted anti-Israeli slogans and strongly condemned attempts by Tel Aviv to consign the issue of Palestine into oblivion. 

They called on the Jordanian government to dismiss the Israeli ambassador and recall Amman’s envoy from Tel Aviv.

The protesters also voiced their support for Hamas and other Palestinian resistance groups.

On Friday, Israeli soldiers and tanks were deployed near the fence separating the occupied territories from the besieged Gaza Strip.

At least nine Palestinians were injured during clashes with Israeli soldiers in the eastern Gaza Strip close to the border with Israel.

Ashraf al-Qedra, spokesman of the Health Ministry in Gaza, told reporters that one of the nine Palestinians injured by Israeli gunfire was in critical condition.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu threatened on Thursday that Tel Aviv would wage a broad military campaign on Gaza if needed, after a two-day flare-up of cross-border fighting that has left several people injured on both sides.

The “Great March of Return” protests demand the right to return for those driven out of their homeland by Israeli aggression. They started on March 30 last year. Tensions have since been running high on the edge of Gaza.

Gazans plan to stage a massive protest on Saturday to commemorate the first anniversary of the demonstrations, in the course of which Israeli soldiers have killed over 260 Palestinians. At least 26,000 Palestinians have also been wounded in the protests, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.

A United Nations fact-finding mission has found that Israeli forces committed rights violations during their crackdown against the Palestinian protesters in Gaza that may amount to war crimes.

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