The mayor of Uccle, where the Israeli embassy is located, denounced the demonstration as not peaceful. ”There were hateful remarks made, particularly against the State of Israel and himself as mayor,” he stressed.

For the second consecutive day, police used tear gas and water cannon to disperse a unauthorized pro-Palestinian demonstration outside the Israeli embassy in Brussels on Wednesday evening.

At least a thousand demonstrators, mostly students of the Palestine Solidarity Network from VUB and ULB universities, gathered to denunce ‘’the  Belgian government’s lack of action to condemn Israeli acts of violence in Palestine. According to Belgian media, the call to demonstrate  after a VUB student had to undergo surgery after being hit in the face by a water cannon the day earlier. .

The demonstrators, who called for an “end to the holocaust in Gaza” and for sanctions against Israel by Belgium and the European Union,  blocked the crossroads leading to he embassy, an action which prompted police to use a water canon and tear gas to disperse them.

Boris Dilles, mayor of Uccle, the Brussels commune where the embassy is located, pointed out that “for the second time an unauthorized demonstration had been organized in front of the Israeli embassy.’’

’’ Since there was no request, the demonstration was unauthorized and therefore illegal,” he told Belgian press agency Belga.

According to the mayor, in a bid to de-escalate the situation, the demonstrators were asked to leave after 15 minutes, but did not comply. “I therefore authorized the police to disperse the demonstrators”, he said.

He denounced the demonstration as not peaceful. ”There were hateful remarks made, particularly against the State of Israel and himself as mayor,” he stressed.

Most of the allegations shouted by the demonstrators were repetitions of the atrocities that actually were committed by Hamas on its terrorist attack on Israel on 7 October.