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13-10-2025
SYDNEY: Tens of thousands of people joined a pro-Palestinian rally in the business district of Australia’s most populous city, Sydney, on Sunday, organizers said, after a court this week blocked a move to hold the protest at the Sydney Opera House.
Around 27 protests took place across Australia on Sunday including in Melbourne and Sydney, said the organizer, the Palestine Action Group, which estimated a crowd of 30,000 at the Sydney rally. Police did not have a crowd estimate for the protest.
The rallies took place against the backdrop of Israeli troops pulling back under the first phase of a US-brokered agreement to end the war in Gaza, which has killed tens of thousands of people and left much of the enclave in ruins.
Amal Naser, an organizer of the Sydney rally, said “even if the ceasefire holds, Israel is still conducting a military occupation of Gaza and the West Bank”.
“The occupation as well as systemic discrimination against Palestinians living in Israel constitute an Apartheid system,” she said in a statement.
Australian Broadcasting Corp footage showed protesters, many carrying Palestinian flags and wearing keffiyeh scarves, marching on closed city streets. Police said no arrests were made.
Executive Council of Australian Jewry, an umbrella group for more than 200 Jewish organizations, condemned the protest organizers. “They want the deal to fail, which would mean the war would continue,” co-chief executive Peter Wertheim said in a statement.
Pro-Palestinian protests have been common in Australia, especially in Sydney and Melbourne, since war in Gaza erupted after Hamas miltants killed 1,200 Israelis in an attack on Oct. 7, 2023.
Gaza authorities say more than 67,000 people have been killed and much of the enclave flattened since Israel began its military response to the Hamas attack.
The march organized by Palestine Action Group (PAG) in Sydney has reached its final destination in Belmore Park.
Neither the organizers nor NSW police are yet to provide an estimate for Sunday’s crowd in Sydney, but it appears to have been several thousand, short of the 40,000 on the form 1 application originally submitted to march to the Opera House.
The protest, which marks more than two years since the start of the conflict in Gaza, appears to have passed without incident, although marchers had to contend with rain and strong winds.
In Sydney’s Hyde Park, the pro-Palestine march is starting to move off from the northern end of the park.
Organizers say they don’t have an indication of numbers yet, but it is safe to say it is not on the scale of the Harbour Bridge march. However, like that March, it has now started to rain heavily.
A line of police behind a barricade is blocking off Macquarie Street, which leads down to the Opera House. Instead, protesters are being marshalled west down Prince Albert Street towards the city, before they head south down George Street towards Belmore Park.
Abubakir Rafiq, who returned to Sydney on Friday, tells the crowd:
I’ve been freed but what about those two Palestinians that I saw at the same time that I was brought to prison? I was freed alongside the other activists, but what about the 10,000 Palestinian hostages that are being held in prison?
Before setting off, the crowd heard about an hour of speakers including NSW Greens MP Jenny Leong and four Australians released from Israeli detention. (Int’l News Desk)
