TEHRAN – Million of Muslims demonstrated Friday across the Middle East in support of the Palestinians and against the intensifying Israeli bombardment of Gaza, underscoring the risk of a wider regional conflict as the occupying regime prepares for a possible ground invasion.
From the typically sedate streets of downtown Amman in Jordan, to Yemen’s war-scarred capital of Sanaa, huge crowds of Muslim worshippers poured into the streets after weekly Friday prayers, angered by devastating Israeli airstrikes on Gaza that began after Hamas launched an unprecedented surprise operation against Israel last Saturday.
At Al-Aqsa Mosque in the Old City of Al-Quds, Zionist troops were permitting only certain older men, women and children to enter the sprawling hilltop compound for prayers, trying to limit the potential for protests. Only 5,000 worshippers made it into the site, the Islamic endowment that manages the mosque said. On a typical Friday, some 50,000 perform the prayers.
“We can’t live, we can’t breathe, they are killing everything that is good within us,” said Ahmad Barbour, a 57-year-old cleaner, red-faced and seething after troops blocked him from entering for prayers.
“Everything that is forbidden to us is allowed to them,” he added, referring to the Israelis.
Hundreds of young Palestinian worshippers who had been turned away from the Old City threw down small prayer rugs on the street in the east Al-Quds neighborhood of Wadi Joz and prayed in the open. When some of the men started shouting, Zionist forces charged into the crowd with batons and fired rounds of tear gas at the worshippers, wounding at least six people, said the Palestinian Red Crescent.
Thousands demonstrated in Amman in neighboring Jordan, some crying out: “We are going to Al-Quds as millions of martyrs!”
“What do they want from Palestine? Do they expect them to leave?” asked protester Omar Abu-Sundos. “For what remains of Palestine to leave? They won’t leave.”
In Beirut, thousands of protesters waved Lebanese, Palestinian and Hezbollah flags, chanting slogans in support of Gaza and calling for “death to Israel.” The resistance movement in neighboring Lebanon has launched sporadic attacks since the Hamas operation.
However, Hezbollah’s deputy secretary-general warned that it would be “on the lookout” for the United States and British naval vessels heading to the Mediterranean Sea.
“Your battleships do not interest us, nor do your statements frighten us,” Sheikh Naim Qassim said at a rally in a southern suburb of Beirut. “When the time is right to take action, we will do so.”
In Baghdad, tens of thousands of protesters gathered in Tahrir Square — the protest hub of Iraq’s capital — for rallies.
“We, as Iraqis, know the pain of having an occupier on our land,” said protester Alaa al-Arabyia, referring to the U.S. occupation of Iraq following its 2003 invasion. “Palestinian women have husbands, loved ones and sons fighting the occupation. We stand with them in their struggle.”
Across Iran, millions of demonstrators also streamed into the streets after prayers. In Tehran, they burned Israeli and American flags, chanting: “Death to Israel,” “Death to America,” “Israel will be doomed,” and “Palestine will be the conqueror.”
“The Palestinian people are fed up, now your idea is to destroy Gaza, the houses of the people,” Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi said in a speech in the country’s southern Fars province. “The people of the world and Palestine will cause trouble for you.”
In the Syrian capital of Damascus, protesters — including Palestinians from the Yarmouk refugee camp formed after the 1948 war surrounding Israel’s creation — also rallied.
“I tell the people not to leave their homes otherwise they will be like our grandparents who left Palestine and came to Syria but never returned,” Ahmad Saeed, a 23-year-old Palestinian living in Syria, said, referring to the 1948 war.
In Yemen’s Sanaa, demonstrators crowded the streets waving Yemeni and Palestinian flags. The people’s slogan long has been: “God is the greatest; death to America; death to Israel; curse of the Jews; victory to Islam.”
“We are ready to participate actively and send hundreds of thousands of mujahedeen ... .to defend Palestine, the Palestinian people and the holy sites,” the Sanaa-based government said in a statement Friday.
Thousands of people in the Qatari capital of Doha took part in demonstrations in support of the

Palestinian people after Friday prayers.
Videos and photos showed huge crowds, made up of locals and expatriate workers, gathering in the city’s central West Bay area, carrying Palestinian flags and chanting in support of Gaza’s residents.
After Friday prayers, Egyptian demonstrators ringed the historic Al-Azhar Mosque in downtown Cairo, the Sunni Muslim world’s foremost religious institution, chanting that Israel remained their enemy “generation after generation.” They repeated the traditionally nationalistic slogan, “We give our souls and blood to Al-Aqsa.”
Pro-Palestinian protests were also held in Syria, Tunisia and Libya.
Political and religious parties staged dozens of demonstrations across the Pakistani cities of Karachi, Lahore, Peshawar, and the capital Islamabad, where U.S. and Israeli flags were burned.
“International media and international courts turn a blind eye to the injustices with the Palestinians. But they only notice the actions that the Palestinians take to defend themselves,” said Faheem Ahmed, a worshipper in Karachi. “They call it terrorism.”
Protester Shahid Husain, 47, said the leaders of Muslim nations were failing to stand up for Palestinians.
“We came to the streets to make our rulers realize that they don’t need to be scared of the U.S. and that the public wants them to be on the side of Palestine - not Israel and America,” he said from Peshawar’s historic Qissa Khwani Bazaar.
In Afghanistan, people gathered in the cities of Kabul and Jalalabad for pro-Palestinian rallies.
“Palestine you are not alone, we are with you,” one speaker told the crowd. “We are poor, but we will do whatever we can. We can’t do much today but use our feet and stand in your support.”