Thousands of protesters have staged rallies across war-ravaged Yemen to demonstrate their full support for Palestinians amid a vicious Israeli military onslaught that has claimed a spiraling casualty toll in the Gaza Strip.
Massive crowds of people marched along streets in the capital, Sana’a, on Monday, waving the Palestinian flag alongside the Yemeni one and chanting slogans in solidarity with the Palestinian cause.
They rejected the Israeli regime’s attacks against Palestinians, their territories and sanctities, and set fire to Israeli and American flags.
The participants also chanted “Death to Israel” and “Death to America,” stressing that the Palestinian cause has been and will remain the central issue of the Muslim world, and that freedom-loving people will never abandon it.
They also denounced Israeli crimes against Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip and occupied Jerusalem al-Quds, and condemned assaults on worshipers at al-Aqsa Mosque as an insult to the entire Muslim world.
“We are ready to assist the coalition of aggression [launching war] against Yemen if its fighter jets are employed to liberate Palestine,” Mohammed Ali al-Houthi, a senior member of Yemen’s Supreme Political Council, said in his speech.
He also stressed the need for a media and political campaign against Israel, calling upon Yemeni media outlets to mobilize people for such a goal.
Houthi said Israeli forces carried out attacks on the al-Aqsa Mosque compound and across Jerusalem al-Quds, stressing that Arab and Muslim nations have a duty to stand by Palestinian resistance groups against such attacks.
He pointed out that Saudi Arabia has designated the Palestinian Hamas resistance movement as a terrorist organization only because it rejected US and Israeli projects.
For his part, the representative of the Islamic Jihad movement in Yemen, Ahmed Barakeh, said the intensity of the Israeli military’s bombardment campaign against the Gaza Strip shows the extent of damage that Palestinian rocket attacks have left on the regime.
He said the Operation Jerusalem al-Quds Sword is a drill for the final battle with the occupying regime of Israel.
In turn, the representative of Hamas in Yemen, Moaz Abu Shamala, made it clear that Jerusalem al-Quds will remain in the heart of every free Arab and Muslim.
He stressed that the latest round of fighting with Israel started in defense of al-Aqsa Mosque, the residents of Jerusalem al-Quds and Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood.
In the northwestern Yemeni city of Sa’ada on Monday, protesters carried Yemeni and Palestinian flags and chanted slogans like “Inevitable Victory is Coming", "The Beginning of the End of Israel", "The Zionist Aggression with an American Cover” and “Strike the Pillars of the Occupier and Topple it.”
A similar rally was also staged in the northern Yemeni city of Hajjah, where demonstrators voiced their support for al-Aqsa Mosque and Palestine.
Tensions escalated in Jerusalem al-Quds, the occupied West Bank and Gaza amid the planned expulsion of dozens of Palestinians from Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, where illegal Israeli settlers are looking to take over the properties of Palestinian families.
At least 200 people, including 58 children, have been killed in the Gaza Strip since the latest violence began a week ago. More than 1,300 Palestinians were also wounded.
The UN Security Council met on Sunday to discuss the violence but failed to agree on even a joint statement of concern.
China said it was the United States that obstructed the council from speaking “with one voice.”