Australian school students walked out of classrooms to protest Israelâs genocide against Gaza on Thursday. There were school strikes in Melbourne, Sydney, Canberra, Wollongong and Adelaide.
International Youth and Students for Social Equality (IYSSE) campaigners spoke with students at the protests in Melbourne and Sydney. The IYSSE was the only group advancing a socialist program to fight against genocide and war. Read the IYSSEâs coverage of the demonstrations here.
In Sydney, Zainab, a university student studying psychology and marketing, said: âItâs very important for young people in Australia to show their support for Palestine. To show the Australian government we care about what is happening. War crimes are being committed, which is nothing new, but this is on a whole other scale. It is genocide and theyâre doing it openly. They are not trying to hide it.
âThey are not going after Hamas. Theyâre still trying to convince the world that all Palestinians in Gaza are Hamas, which is obviously not true. Theyâve just killed these people.â
Zainab said the coverage of the previous school strike was âdisgusting. They thought they could scare students, but they donât realise that weâre seeing kids, our own age, being blown up. Weâre seeing schools blown up. We donât see it as fair that we can continue to go to school safely, whereas our government is openly supporting Israel blowing up schools and students.â
On the revelations that Israeli intelligence had prior warning of the October 7th uprising and facilitated it being carried out, she said, âIâve seen that. It shows Netanyahu and his government donât even care about their own people. They care about power and land. Thatâs their main goal. Theyâre like happy to sacrifice their people if it means that they can continue their brutalization of Palestinians.
âTheyâre calling October 7th Israelâs 9/11. They are using it as an excuse to commit this violence. I donât think anything was a good enough excuse for Americaâs invasion of Iraq and killing two million innocent Iraqis. Israel is just repeating what their friends in America have done.â
âThe governments all around the world are not for the people. It is disheartening to see thousands coming out into the streets in Australia, but the government doesnât listen. I have seen comments on Penny Wong and Albaneseâs Instagrams, telling them people donât want their tax money going towards killing kids in the Middle East.â
The IYSSE member raised the call by the Palestinian Trade Unions for workers to stop sending military arms to Israel she said, âI agree with that, it shows that people do have some power. It shows us that we can do something and weâre not hopeless.â
Source: Wsws.org
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