In a particularly tense context this year, after 35 people died during five days of clashes between the Israeli army and Palestinian armed groups in the Gaza Strip in early May, the demonstration is taking place under close surveillance. Tens of thousands of Jews gather Thursday, May 12 in Jerusalem for the traditional “march of flags”, a nationalist rally marking the capture of the eastern part of the Holy City by Israel in 1967, and regularly enamelled with violence.
An incident was recorded at Damascus Gate in the Old City, when march participants attacked journalists with stones and bottles, according to correspondents from Agence France-presse (AFP). Earlier, AFP journalists had seen young Jews spit on Palestinians and beat one up before being dispersed by the police. Some protesters chanted “Death to the Arabs”.
“Warning Rocket”
In Gaza, thousands of people waving Palestinian flags gathered at the border with Israel, and the Israeli army fired tear gas at people approaching the fence, according to AFP journalists. A Palestinian security source in Gaza reported that the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas, which controls the territory, fired a “warning rocket” towards the Mediterranean Sea, without giving details.
The march of the flags is one of the demonstrations organized by Israel on the occasion of Yom Yerushalaim (“Day of Jerusalem” in Hebrew) to celebrate the “reunification” of the city after the occupation and the annexation of its Palestinian part to the following the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. The UN does not recognize Israel’s annexation of East Jerusalem, which it considers illegal under international law.
On Wednesday, Nabil Abou Roudeina, spokesman for Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, warned Israel against its “insistence” to organize this walk “provocative”proof according to him of “Israeli government assent to the views of Jewish extremists”. Hamas condemned “the campaign of the Zionist occupation against our people in occupied Jerusalem under the pretext of providing security for the ‘flag march'”.
” Provocation “
The Israeli police deployed in force in Al-Wad Street, one of the main arteries of the Old City, where the shops had closed. The march must end at the Wailing Wall, a holy place for Jews located below the esplanade of the Mosques, the third holiest place in Islam. The esplanade is built on what the Jews call the Temple Mount, the holiest site in Judaism.
Defying the prohibition of the rabbinate, according to which the Jews do not have the right to go on the mount of the Temple, some go there nevertheless to visit, in an increasing way these last years. Ultranationalists sometimes take the opportunity to pray surreptitiously there, which the Palestinians denounce as ” Provocation “. The Israeli police announced that they had deployed 2,500 officers to ensure public order. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has already caused nearly 200 deaths since the beginning of the year.