Gazan workers mark May Day

Thousands of Palestinians have held May Day demonstrations in the Gaza Strip, calling for an end to the Israeli siege on the blockaded enclave.

Gaza’s May Day protests were held Saturday near the northern Erez border crossing between the Gaza Strip and Israel and also at Rafah in the southern sector of the strip on the border with Egypt.

Israeli and Egyptian authorities have kept the Erez and Rafah crossings tightly sealed, allowing only a tiny trickle of goods to enter Gaza.

The demonstrators held signs calling for an end to the Israeli blockade.

“We call on the world to stop the siege of Gaza and to come to the defense of Palestinian workers in all Palestinian territories,” said Ramzi Rabah, a protest organizer with the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP).

Salah Zidan, another member of the DFLP said that the Gaza workers live in dire conditions due to the blockade.

“The workers are living under some of the worst conditions as a result of the occupation and the split (between the Palestinian factions) and the siege on the Gaza Strip. We call on everybody to end these destructive conditions, return to unity and lift this oppressive siege,” Zidan said.

May Day or International Worker’s Day is marked in remembrance of several Chicago workers who were killed when local police fired on them during a general strike in 1886.