PARIS: Thousands of protesters calling for Israel to stop its offensive in the Gaza Strip took to the streets of European cities yesterday, as the onslaught entered its fourth week.

The biggest pro-Palestinian rally took place in the French capital, where several thousand people, many carrying Palestinian and Lebanese flags, marched through the city center behind a banner declaring “Palestinian resistance: Stop the French-Israeli collaboration.”

Representatives of the Palestinian Authority’s delegation in France joined the march called by several peace and human rights organizations.

Similar groups in Greece along with the country’s main civil servants’ and workers’ unions supported anti-Israel rallies in Athens and other Greek cities.

In Athens, more than 1,000 demonstrators gathered in central Syntagma Square and marched to the Israeli Embassy, led by some 30 Palestinian immigrants and holding banners reading “Free Palestine” and “Stop the massacre now”.

The UN European headquarters was the rallying point in Geneva for hundreds to protest Israel’s attacks on Gaza which have left at least 1,200 Palestinians dead including 410 children.

The demonstrators, many of whom were wearing white T-shirts or were draped in white cloth marked with “Gaza” in red, chanted “Israel, terrorist” and “Stop the massacre of Palestinian people,” as they formed a circle around rows of white bundles on the ground. The bundles symbolized the “number of dead in Gaza,” said one organizer Hafid Ouardiri. “They did not die for nothing. They are dead so that the Palestinians can be free,” he said.

Many children were also present at the Geneva protest, some carrying “Stop the massacre” placards and marching within the circle of protesters.

“We have asked all our children to invite their schoolmates to join us here because children have become the symbol of those buffeted in this conflict,” Ouardiri said. Thousands of people waving Palestinian flags marched through Rome yesterday in a demonstration against Israel’s offensive in Gaza.

A large banner reading “Life, land and liberty for the Palestinian people” led the Rome demonstration.

Israel’s main ally the United States was a target of protesters’ anger in Turkey, where around 400 activists rallied across from the US Embassy in Ankara.

They held banners reading “Down with the great Satan!” and “USA: You are shareholders of the crime organization Israel” as riot police prevented them from approaching the embassy building.

On Istanbul’s main commercial street, activists from Amnesty International erected mock gravestones marked with “Killed while helping the injured” and “Died because of lack of medicines” to protest the killing of civilians in Gaza.

No major incidents were reported in the European demonstrations. In Paris the window of a McDonald’s restaurant was broken along the protesters’ march route on rue de Rivoli.