Organisers of Great March reply to US claims

The international spokesperson for the Great March of Return, Dr Asad Abu Sharkh, on Saturday rejected claims by US ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, that the Islamic Resistance Movement – Hamas – has been using children as human shields.

In a press statement released yesterday, the official accused Haley of unashamedly peddling the propaganda of the Israeli occupation army; “Haley keeps using such cheap propaganda to encourage the Israeli occupation to commit more crimes against the Palestinian people, including children.”

While Israeli journalists like Gideon Levy have strongly condemned the occupation forces for its massacres, Abu Sharkh pointed out that the US ambassador has been justifying their crimes after they were “ordered to shoot to kill and maim.”

The noble goal of this Great March of Return, the statement explained “is to peacefully and nonviolently implement our right of return to the homes and property from which we were uprooted.”

The Palestinian people “have been waiting for justice for the last seventy years and can wait no longer”, said Abu Sharkh.

The statement ended with a pledge by the organisers to continue with their nonviolent March of Return for as long as it takes to regain Palestinian rights.