Senior Hamas leader Mahmoud Al-Zahar said on Friday that protesters participating in the Great March of Return “undermined a hellish and aggressive plan prepared against Gaza,” Palestine Information Centre reported.
Al-Zahar claimed the plan consisted of “cutting salaries of the public servants, banning medicines and medical equipment from entering Gaza, halting support for the education and agriculture sectors”. He added: “this was planned to be part of the deal of the century,” the name given to President Donald Trump’s impending peace initiative.
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Al-Zahar stressed that these measures aimed to push Palestinians in the besieged Gaza Strip to “stand up against Hamas and the resistance programme”. He emphasises: “The result was the opposite. Gaza residents took part in the Great Return March and strongly stood up against the Israeli occupation.”
In addition, Al-Zahar said: “All of those who accepted Trump’s plan and gave their money to him, to the Israeli occupation and its collaborators, will be part of the defeat”.
PHOTOS: 2 killed, 124 injured in Gaza protests
The Great March of Return has been ongoing since March and has claimed the lives of 152 Palestinians and left over 21,000 injured. Many of those injured suffocated from tear gas inhalation or were shot by live ammunition.