RAMALLAH/GAZA, June 5 (Xinhua) -- The Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem marked on Wednesday the 46th anniversary of the Arab-Israeli War, calling on ending the Israeli occupation and establish an independent state.
Rallies and protests were organized in various areas in the Palestinian territories to mark the anniversary, as clashes between dozens of Palestinian demonstrators and Israeli soldiers broke out near the Offer Prison in the outskirts of the West Bank city of Ramallah.
The demonstrators waving Palestinian flags threw stones at the soldiers and chanted slogans calling for the end of the Israeli military occupation of the Palestinian territories. The Israeli soldiers used tear gas canisters and rubble bullets to disperse the demonstrators, leaving several protesters lightly injured.
Wassel Abu Yousef, an official of Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) who joined the demonstration near Ramallah, said that the anniversary of the Israeli occupation "is so painful, but at the same time, it boosts the Palestinians' steadfastness to get rid of the occupation."
Hanan Ashrawi, another PLO official, told reporters that the Palestinian people "will keep struggling until they gain their legitimate rights of self-determination and establishing their independent state."
She went on saying that "after 46 years of repression, occupation, confiscation of lands, killings and destruction, it is time for the world to wake up and end this occupation."
Various Palestinian national and Islamic factions and political powers also marked the anniversary. They said in a joint leaflet that "the 46-year occupation clearly shows how aggressive Israel is."
In West Bank, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas Fatah Party said in a press release to mark the anniversary that "peace, economic development and tranquility can never be achieved in the region before ending the longest military occupation of the Palestinian territories in the modern history."
Meanwhile, the Islamic Hamas movement which ruled the Gaza Strip, said in a press statement to mark the anniversary that the Palestinian people have a full right to live free and independent on their lands, adding that "sooner or later, and the occupied lands will go back to its Palestinian owners."
Jamal al-Khudari, a member of the Palestinian parliament and chairman of the Popular Committee to confront the Israeli siege, told Xinhua that "The shortest road to achieve real peace is to give the Palestinian people their legitimate rights."
"I believe that this anniversary is a great opportunity for the Palestinian people to end their division and confront the Israeli occupation," he added.
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