MARAKESH (Dispatches) -- Tens of thousands of Moroccans protested in Rabat on Sunday against the kingdom’s four-year-old normalization of ties with Israel, one day before the first anniversary of the Zionist regime’s invasion of Gaza. 
Demonstrators waved Palestinian flags and brandished signs denouncing the country’s participation in the Abraham Accords normalization deals, chanting “Resistance does not die” and “The people want an end to normalization.”
They also waved Lebanese flags and held portraits of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, who was assassinated in an Israeli strike on southern Beirut on September 27.
Hezbollah has been attacking Israeli settlements and military posts since the day after Hamas’s operation last year, and in recent weeks Israel has escalated its aggression against Lebanon, launching a limited ground invasion in the country’s south last week.
Khadija Mokhtari, a 56-year-old retiree living in the capital, told AFP at the protest near parliament, “We consider Palestine to be a national cause.”
She said she joined the protest to demonstrate against “flagrant injustice, Israeli killings and the genocide” against Palestinians.
Another protester, Noufissa Souad, 39, said: “They are going to kill the entire Palestinian people for their land,” and said Arab and Muslim leaders must speak out.
“We are hand in hand with the enemy,” she added.
The streets of Rabat also saw anti-Israel demonstrations last year in the immediate wake of the Gaza invasion, with protesters burning an Israeli flag and condemning the onslaught.
Morocco established official ties in Israel in 2020 as part of the U.S.-led Abraham Accords, which also saw agreements with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Sudan.
The North African kingdom has officially called for “the immediate, complete and permanent halt to the Israeli war on Gaza,” but has not publicly discussed reversing normalization.
Ahead of October 7, 2023, ties between Israel and Morocco had expanded rapidly, with Rabat buying advanced drones and other military equipment as well as cybersecurity products.
Bilateral trade grew by a third in 2022, while some 200,000 Zionists visited Morocco, according to official figures.  
Sunday’s rally was organized by the National Action Group for Palestine, which brings together leftist groups and the Justice and Development Party.