Palestinian factions urge calm

Palestinian factions have sent out repeated messages encouraging the protests but calling for restraint.

The anniversary has come as Egypt again tries to broker a long-term ceasefire between Hamas and Israel, and experts believe the Palestinian movement is keen that a deal is not scuppered.

“We want to cut short the way ahead of the Israeli occupation, which always blames the Palestinian resistance groups for the failure of reaching a truce and easing the more than decade-old siege imposed on Gaza,” Khaled al-Batsh, an Islamic Jihad leader and member of the march’s organising committee, said on Thursday, calling on protests to remain peaceful.

Gaza’s interior ministry said on Saturday it has deployed 8,000 members of the security, police and emergency services around Gaza.

“Our message on this day: we are with our people,” the ministry tweeted.