The group of about 30 tourists allegedly “violently” intimidated the activists. Authorities have identified four attackers, but protesters say there will be “no legal repercussions.”
This Saturday, the Coimbra pela Palestine collective reported an attack, by a group of Russian tourists residing in Israel, on activists who demonstrated in the city on Friday.
In a statement sent to the Lusa agency, the group, which has been demonstrating in Largo D. Dinis since May 3, with messages of solidarity and Palestinian symbols, claims to have been the object of “death threats, kicks and hate speeches.” .
According to reports, tourists, around 30, between 60 and 70 years old and accompanied by a guide, they toured the initiative they call “Assentada” and, after approaching and spitting out the pro-Palestinian materials, they broke one of the flags and began to kick and threaten to kill the participants in the demonstration.
In the same note, the Palestinian group from Coimbra added that the tourists “violently intimidated one of the activists, who is a woman, a minor and racialized.” calling him a fascist, a monkey and recommending that he “go back to Africa”.
The police were called to the scene and the group guarantees that at least four attackers were identified. “In the end, the authorities wanted to clarify that this process will not have legal repercussions for the offenders, because they are tourists and this international nature makes the measures provided for by law bureaucratically difficult,” the group stressed in a statement.
This Saturday, activists expressed their condemnation of the “racist and xenophobic aggression.” “The Coimbra pela Palestine collective demonstrates its deep repudiation and intolerance after the events of racist and xenophobic violence by the Zionists, in Assentada on May 17, and against all the repression imposed on pro-Palestinian voices in the world,” transmitted in the same note.
Source: Observadora
