Cover image: People march for Palestine in Haverfordwest last month
This Saturday 16th December, protesters will again target Preseli and Pembrokeshire Tory MP Stephen Crabb, demanding that the UK government stops supporting Israel’s genocide on Gaza.
The protest will assemble on the Old Bridge in Haverfordwest at 2pm on Saturday 16th December, before marching through Bridge Street and up to Stephen Crabb’s Constituency office on Upper Market Street where further speeches will be heard.
The demonstration will take place as part of coordinated local rallies around the UK this weekend following hundreds of such demonstrations since the War on Gaza began.
In Cardiff, protesters will gather for the 10th week running, assembling at 12 noon at the Nye Bevan Statue, Queen St on Saturday. As well as calling for a ceasefire, the demonstration is also aimed at promoting the all Wales campaign to boycott Israeli goods and institutions.
Organisers of the Haverfordwest action, Stop The War Pembrokeshire and Solidarity with Palestine Pembrokeshire, said: “The need to join the ever growing voices of opposition to Israel’s unfolding war crimes against Palestine is becoming more pressing by the day.”
Since October 7, over 18,000 Palestinians have been killed and 50,000 injured in Israeli attacks, 20,000 of these injuries are children.
Most of northern Gaza has been reduced to rubble. More than 7,729 Palestinian children, 5,133 women and 296 Palestinian Health Workers have been killed while the UN Relief and Workers Agency reports that nearly 1.9 million Palestinians have been displaced by the war on Gaza which has also seen 132 United Nations Staff members Killed.
It is also believed that half of all Palestinians in Gaza are now starving and with extreme shortages of sanitary and medical supplies, while Israel has targeted and killed journalists and their families.
272 Palestinians have also been killed by Israeli forces and settlers in the occupied West Bank in the last nine weeks.
“This collective punishment of Palestinians within the open air prison which is Gaza, now shows most of the identifiable indicators globally recognised to signify an unfolding genocide,” the organisers said. “Not only is our Government complicit in this genocide they are actively supporting it in the form of military aid, while UK arms companies’ profits soar as they sell a plethora or weaponry to Israel.”
The Haverfordwest protest will aim to apply pressure on local Members of Parliament and the government to demand an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, and to urge Israel to lift the siege that has deprived the people of Gaza of essential resources such as medical supplies, food, electricity, and water.
Adam Johannes, with the Stop the War Coalition Wales, said: “We are protesting in support of the right of Palestinians to live freely in their own land rather than being subjected to military occupation, siege, refugee camps and exile.”
“According to a YouGov poll, 76% of the public favour an immediate ceasefire, but MPs overwhelmingly oppose calling for one. Welsh politics is now at the crossroads with only 5 out of Wales’ 40 MPs supporting a ceasefire now”
Afia Ahmed, one of the protestors from Haverfordwest, said Israel was cundcting open genocide with “impunity.”
“The words from the Israeli regime are steeped in Islamophobia and genocidal intent, yet the UK and USA remain silent on calling for a ceasefire,” they said. “These so-called leaders will not be forgiven by history. Millions worldwide are protesting, striking, and demanding an end to the Gaza massacre. We’ll persist in our vigils and protests in Pembrokeshire until our voices are acknowledged. We urge our MP, who is meant to be our voice in Westminster, to advocate for what we demand – the ending of the Israeli occupation, the end to the decades long blockade of Gaza and the West Bank and the freedom of the Palestinian people.”
Nine-year-old protester Aklimah said that they “just want Israel to stop killing children!”
“You can’t justify it by saying terrorists hide in schools with children. You would not bomb a school in Israel if a member of Hamas was in there. You would not bomb a hospital in Israel if a few people from Hamas were hiding underneath it. So why do you think you can kill thousands of people in Gaza to try to get to a very few people? It doesn’t make any sense and it’s not fair! If I understand this as a 9 year old kid then why doesn’t my MP get it and why doesn’t my Prime Minister understand?”
Weekly vigils have been taking place in Haverfordwest at 7.00pm every Friday since the attacks on Gaza began and are expected to continue until calls for a ceasefire are answered.
All details of Saturday’s demonstration can be found at the Facebook event
