SAN DIEGO — A protest was held Tuesday in Downtown San Diego led by the Palestinian Youth Movement's local chapter as part of a global day of action. Protesters gathered at the Edward J. Schwartz Federal Building on Front Street to demand the U.S. cease military funding of Israel. The group then made their way through the streets of downtown.
The U.S. provides nearly $4 billion in foreign military aid to Israel each year, according to the Palestinian Youth Movement.
"In response to escalating Israeli aggression in Jerusalem and Gaza, Palestinians and their allies are protesting U.S. military funding to Israel that enables this violence and taking to the streets of San Diego to uplift Palestinian demands for justice," one member of the Palestinian Youth Movement's San Diego chapter wrote. "Today, we join protests in over 50 cities across the United States and Canada and an estimated 150 protests around the world."
"The direct economic link between our taxes and the Israeli military highlights the complicity of the United States In the ongoing genocide of our people," one protest leader said through a loudspeaker to the hundreds of demonstrators gathered in front of the federal building downtown.
"I feel empathy for people who are struggling as these people are," said San Diegan Annie O'Brien, who was among the protestors marching through the streets Tuesday.
"It is tragic, especially when there are children and whole families losing their homes and being punished for having done nothing wrong," she told News 8.
The protest in San Diego was endorsed by 12 local, civil and human rights organizations.
PHOTOS: Palestinian protest in San Diego
Since the fighting began last week between Israel and Gaza’s Hamas rulers, the Israeli military has launched hundreds of airstrikes it says are targeting Hamas’ militant infrastructure, according to reports by the Associated Press, while Palestinian militants have fired more than 3,400 rockets from civilian areas in Gaza at civilian targets in Israel.
Heavy fighting broke out on May 10 when Gaza's militant Hamas rulers fired long-range rockets toward Jerusalem in support of Palestinian protests against Israel’s heavy-handed policing of the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, a flashpoint site sacred to Jews and Muslims, and the threatened eviction of dozens of Palestinian families by Jewish settlers.
At least 213 Palestinians have been killed in airstrikes since, including 61 children and 36 women, with more than 1,440 people wounded, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which does not break the numbers down into fighters and civilians. Hamas and Islamic Jihad say at least 20 of their fighters have been killed in the fighting, while Israel says the number is at least 160.
In a phone call to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this week, President Biden "reiterated his firm support for Israel's right to defend itself," and, for the first time, expressed support for a ceasefire.
"I think a ceasefire is only the first step of many," said Palestinian Youth Movement leader Ramah Awad, who helped organize the demonstration in San Diego. "I think the US has everything in its power to actually end this violence immediately."