By BALA CHAMBERS
Led by social movements who understand the plight of the Palestinian people, Spain’s government has cut arms sales and pledged continued funding for a vital aid agency as thousands have taken to the streets to denounce the onslaught in Gaza.
In December, a few months into Israel’s large-scale onslaught on Gaza, thousands in Spain came together to stand in solidarity with Palestinians in the country’s northern town of Guernica. In a symbolic vigil, the event marked both peoples’ oppression under the far-right.
Between 1936 and 1939, during Spain’s civil war, Guernica was bombed amid the far-right’s overthrow of the country’s democratically elected government. At General Franciso Franco’s behest in 1937, the German Nazi and Italian fascist planes heavily struck Guernica – a centre of the Republican resistance movement. It killed an estimated 1,645 people.
For 36 years, fascist ruler Franco governed Spain with an iron fist, crushing dissent. Authorities imposed a policy known as ‘limpieza social’ or ‘social cleansing’ during the “White Terror” period. Around 150,00 people were estimated to have been killed during Spain’s civil war and dictatorship.
At December’s vigil in Pasialeku Market Place in Guernica, members of trade unions, political parties, and social movements created a mosaic with a human chain depicting a large Palestinian flag, to underscore the victims of the Israeli attacks.
WATCH: Israeli children sing, “We will annihilate everyone” in Gaza, against a background of destruction. Disturbing video was posted, then deleted by Israeli national broadcaster
. We captured it and added English subtitles
https://twitter.com/intifada/status/1726345295515058255
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