This footage was filmed and produced 2 March 2024.

[Note: speech in Turkish]

The Boycott to Israel Movement for Palestine (The Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions - BDS) held a protest in Istanbul against Israel's attacks on Gaza. BDS activists called on Turkish municipalities that signed sister city protocols with Israeli municipalities to cancel these protocols.

BDS activists gathered in front of the Kadikoy Municipality in the Kadikoy district of Istanbul and marched with the slogans "Murderer Israel, get out of Palestine!", "Condemnation is not enough, cut off relations", "You cannot be a sister city with the occupier".

BDS activists also carried the photo of Aaron Bushnell, who died by setting himself on fire in front of the Israeli Embassy for Palestine in the USA.

SOUNDBITE 1, Gulkan Noir:

00:49:55 - 01:12:06
The genocidal attacks of the Israeli occupation and apartheid regime in the Gaza Strip have been continuing for nearly five months. In these attacks, at least 30 thousand Palestinians, the vast majority of whom were civilians, have lost their lives and nearly 2 million Palestinians have been forcibly displaced.

SOUNDBITE 2, Nihle Kale:

01:26:02 - 02:31:18
All the people of the world are on the side of the Palestinian people. We call for an effective isolation of the occupying state in order to increase solidarity with the resisting Palestinian people. We call on Turkish municipalities, which have sister city protocols with various Israeli municipalities for months, to cancel these protocols and not to be accomplices to genocide. We call on Kadikoy Municipality to cancel the Sister City Agreement it established in 2007 with Petah Tikva Municipality, an important organ of the occupation apparatus. Where is Petah Tikva? Petah Tikva; It is the place where the Zionist regime carried out its first mass migration, where the occupation regime established its first agricultural colony and carried out ethnic cleansing at every step. Where is Petah Tikva? It is the first place in the world where the name Trump was given to a square. Petah Tikva is an organ of the occupying and apartheid regime that functions effectively and in harmony with the war apparatus. Brotherhood with Petah Tikva is being complicit in ethnic cleansing and occupation.

SOUNDBITE 3, Gulkan Noir:

02:53:37 - 03:19:03
News of deaths from starvation comes almost every day from Gaza, where hospitals are largely disabled. Two days ago, the occupation forces committed another crime against humanity and opened fire on civilian Palestinians waiting for flour and food distribution on Al-Rashid Street, killing at least 112 people.


SOUNDBITE 4, Nihle Kale:

03:47:02 - 04:38:20
Izmir Municipality is not sister to Tel Aviv Municipality. Marmaris Municipality is not sister to Ashkelon Municipality. Edirne and Antalya municipalities are not siblings with Batyam Municipality. We request that our formal and written applications be put on the agenda of the Municipality Council meetings. We will follow the process. Heeding these calls will be an important note on the date when the sister city protocols were canceled by an honorable decision. Heeding these calls will be a call and set an example to the decision-making authorities of the Republic of Turkey to end all kinds of export and logistics support, especially food exports, to Israel while the genocide continues.