5 August 2014
National Hunger Strike commemoration, Derrylin, Sunday 3 August 2014
The thousands of republicans who marched through the County Fermanagh village of Derrylin on Sunday 3 August were not only remembering the sacrifice of the 1981 H Block hunger strikers they were also demonstrating their support for the Palestinian people and their struggle for freedom.
At the forefront of their minds was the ongoing slaughter, at the hands of the Zionist war machine, of defenceless men, women and children in Gaza.
For the Palestinian Ambassador Ahmad Abdelrazek, who addressed the crowd, the solidarity of those thousands of Irish republicans spoke louder than the ‘offical’ silence of the Irish political establishment.
Also as the United States administration, the British government and the European Union gives the Zionists the green light for genocide republicans can say they stand with the millions of people across the globe who are demanding a stop to the extermination of the people of Gaza.
In a brilliantly pitched speech the Sinn Féin MP for Fermanagh/South Tyrone Michelle Gildernew, who holds the seat won by Bobby Sands in 1981 while on hunger strike, described the prison protest and hunger strike as a “tipping point in Irish history”.
She added “the British aim was to defeat the struggle for Irish unity and independence …. Breaking the prisoners was crucial”.
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Contributions from key figures in the churches, academia and wider civic society as well as senior republican figures