State-organized rallies in Iran mark 1979 US embassy seizure, support Gaza

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State-organized rallies were held across Iran on Saturday marking the 1979 seizure of the US em-bassy with cries in support of Palestinians under Israeli bombardment in Gaza.

Iranian revolutionary students stormed the em-bassy soon after the fall of the US-backed Shah 44 years ago, holding 52 Americans hostage for 444 days.

The act broke diplomatic relations between Washington and Tehran for over three decades. Anger at the US had been growing in Iran for a number of reasons, but it boiled over in October when the US took in the deposed Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi for treatment.

Many of those sentiments remain today amid the heightened tension between Tehran and Wash-ington.

In Tehran, demonstrators marched on Saturday from Palestine Square in the heart of the capital to the former US embassy a few kilometers away.

State television showed demonstrators burning the Israeli flag and carrying pictures of dead Palestinian children from Israeli strikes in Gaza.

The Israeli military has struck Gaza from the air, imposed a siege and launched a ground assault after the Palestinian Islamist militant group Hamas that rules Gaza killed 1,400 people and took more than 240 others captive in an Oct. 7 attack in southern Israel.—APP