This coming year as we remember Bloody Sunday, we do so in the dark shadow of a genocide being carried out against innocent people in another part of the world. And as we prepare for our commemoration we know that over 10,000 people have been killed in Palestine. More than 4,000 were children. By the time we gather in Derry in January it will undoubtedly be many thousands more.
This is happening with the complicity of those who speak most loudly of the “rules based international order” and in the full view of the world’s media. It must be condemned. It must be treated as the war crime that it is. Those responsible must be brought to justice.
The Bloody Sunday Trust is opposed to all killing of civilians in acts of war, be it carried out by Hamas or by the Israeli government. Some support the Israeli Occupation Forces and government, claiming they are acting in self-defence. But it is wrong to describe the Israeli reaction to the attacks on 7 October as an act of self-defence. These actions are in furtherance of an illegal occupation and are not in any way proportionate or justifiable. They are in clear breach of international law.
Israel has been waging a war against the Palestinian people for over seven decades through ethnic cleansing, occupation, apartheid and a brutal siege on Gaza. Any international response that fails to acknowledge this reality is not merely hypocritical but serves to further dehumanise the Palestinian people and deny them the justice, peace, and equality that they are entitled to.
We call on all governments to work towards a just and lasting solution which will provide long-term peace, security and quality of life for Palestinians and Israelis by ending the injustices imposed on the Palestinian population. Those states who choose to make excuses for Israel, who continue to help them, who arm them, will find themselves on the wrong side of history when this injustice is finally recognised and brought to an end. And that will happen, should it take days, months, years or decades. It happened in South Africa. It is happening in Ireland. It will happen in Palestine.
When the so-called ‘Israeli Defence Forces’ compared themselves to the victims of Bloody Sunday, they could not have been more wrong. They bear no resemblance to the victims of Bloody Sunday, but they do bear every resemblance to the perpetrators. They are terrorists in uniform who think they can kill civilians with impunity. The world must teach them that they cannot.
The 2024 commemoration of Bloody Sunday is dedicated to those who are suffering in Palestine.
One world, one struggle, until all are free.
Bloody Sunday Trust, December 2023.
