ADEN – Yemeni protesters angered by Cairo’s co-operation with Israel in imposing a blockade on Gaza stormed the Egyptian consulate in the southern city of Aden yesterday, witnesses said.
The protest comes after about 350 Palestinians were killed and more than 800 were wounded in three days of Israeli air strikes on the enclave, of which Egypt is the only other neighbour.
Egyptian foreign ministry spokesman Hossam Zaki said the incident at the consulate lasted 15 minutes.
One witness said the protesters burned the Egyptian flag and hoisted a Palestinian banner on the building. “Some of the protesters were able to enter the consulate and destroyed some property and papers,” another witness said, adding some of the protesters were Egyptian.
The Egyptian government has been under attack for the past three days for helping Israel in the blockade on the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip for the past six months.
The official Yemeni news agency said 20 Arabs, including some Sudanese, Iraqis and Palestinians, were arrested “for attempting to enter the consulate”. Meanwhile, Gulf Arab leaders called yesterday for an end to Israel’s “massacres” of Palestinians in Gaza but did not unite behind a Qatari call for an emergency Arab summit.
A communique issued after a Gulf summit suggested that the US-allied rulers partly blamed Hamas for the violence, which Israel says the militant faction provoked by firing rockets at southern Israeli towns. – (Reuters)