On the 8th of October, a major Palestinian march took to the streets of DC. Speakers explictly endorsed all-out resistance to Israel’s occupation. One chant was “They’ve got tanks, we’ve got hang gliders-glory to all resistance fighters!” One speaker said the brutal day to day oppression experienced by residents of Gaza made this war absolutely inevitable.

The march from the White House to the State Dept missed coming within easy scout detection range of a “Stand with Israel” rally at the Lincoln Memorial by 20 minutes. It was reported that cops told them to wrap up in a hurry and get out of there.

Had the two sides clashed, a substantial street battle would have been possible given the events in Ft Lauderdale as well as those in Gaza. This would have effectively represented an extension of the fighting in Gaza to the streets of Washington DC. Apparently the civilians at the pro-Israel march were not up for such a battle and quite sensibly withdrew to keep the peace.

While a lot of PSL signs were seen at the march, the main organizers were apparently from the Palestinian community in the DC area.

Gaza has been compared to an open-air prison, thus this rebellion has some of the aspects of a prison uprising. However this war started, it is clear that Gaza is now fighting for their very existance. Israel’s Cabinet secretary is claiming this will be the last war between Israel and Gaza, which implies intention of an absolute wipeout. All war planning inside Gaza will have to take this into account.

Here in DC, this had the feel of “here we go-back in the same old trenches” but this time around is likely to be an entirely different and much nastier war.

Elsewere in the so-called US, there was reported fighting between pro-Israel and pro-Palestine protesters in Ft lauderdale, FL and in Washington state.