The planned six-week protest, which began on 30 March on Palestinian Land Day, is set to end on 15 May – the 70th anniversary of the Palestinian Nakba (Catastrophe), in which more than 750,000 Palestinians were forcibly displaced by Israeli forces during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war.

According to the Ministry of Health, 37 Palestinians have been killed and more than 4,300 have been wounded by Israeli forces since the “Great March of Return” began on 30 March.

Protest organisers have officially labelled Friday’s protest in support of “martyrs and prisoners”, in light of Palestinian Prisoner’s Day earlier this week, but on social media some Palestinians dubbed it the “Friday of Kites”.

“Kites are symbol of peace in all the world,” the young man told MEE. “We fly kites to ensure our right to freedom.” (Middle East Eye, April 20, 2018)

Comment:

Indeed the land of Palestine has been under occupation for the past 70 years, and Gaza in particular has been isolated, bombed, and subjected to severe constrictions to say the least. What has been designated as the Great March of Return has left severe losses in human lives and injuries, the common people resorting to burning tires to deflect and ward off the forces of the Jewish entity who shot live bullets into the march and the protesters injuring thousands of protesters and onlookers.

The people of Gaza have displayed more acts of courage and resistance than their so-called leaders who are quick to proceed with normalization procedures with the Jewish entity while their forces shoot the people of Palestine and those who betrayed them continually.

However what is more grievous is that some of the protesters are constructing kites written with messages to demonstrate their peaceful messages of the refugees’ right to return to their homeland of Palestine. Adding insult to injury while the Muslim Ummah possesses powerful manpower and high tech equipment within their militaries only to be paraded in international displays while the people of Palestine resort to burning tires and building crude gas masks to protect themselves from the poisonous gases shot by the Jewish entity’s forces.

Summoning upon the Muslim armies is the only way to return the refugees and displaced people back to Palestine by eradicating the belligerent Jewish entity and its normalization seeking Palestinian Authority from Palestine to be replaced with a sincere leadership of the Khilafah Rashidah (rightly guided Caliphate). Enough of the cheap struggle! Enough of the cheap bloodshed! Muslim lives are not a cheap commodity to be gambled with or to be liberated by building colorful kites or burning tires.

Manal Bader