Calling for an immediate ceasefire, thousands of people once again demonstrated for Palestine in the streets of downtown Montreal on Saturday.
Published yesterday at 5:17 p.m.
Speakers warmed up the crowd that was gradually gathering in Dorchester Square despite the cold weather in contrast to recent days. Authorities estimated the number of demonstrators at 10,000.
“We need to show our government that people continue to support Palestine,” said Rand, a health care worker of Palestinian descent who said she lost several family members in the bombing of Gaza.
PHOTO JOSIE DESMARAIS, THE PRESS
The crowd then took to the streets around 3:30 p.m., following first René-Lévesque Boulevard and then Sainte-Catherine Street, surrounded by numerous police officers on bicycles and horses.
“Put under pressure”
Justin Trudeau’s position on refraining from calling for a ceasefire is driving many protesters to take to the streets in Israel more than a month after the conflict began, says a representative of the Palestinian Youth Movement, the association behind the organization of the event , Sarah Shamy.
PHOTO JOSIE DESMARAIS, THE PRESS
He is pleased to see that the mobilization is not slowing down. “It is not slowing down and we are seeing different forms of pressure,” she explained, citing the blockade of the Jacques Cartier Bridge last Thursday as “proof that we are ready to use all means to put pressure on our governments .”
The Montreal City Police Department reported no excesses.
The Palestinian youth movement is inviting its supporters to a major nationwide rally in Ottawa next Saturday, an event Sarah Shamy calls “the largest demonstration in support of Palestine in Canadian history.”