The Israeli military has imposed a land, sea and air blockade on the Gaza Strip for more than a decade, cutting the Palestinian territory off from the outside world and leaving many of its residents impoverished, including the al-Ghandour family.

For the past seven weeks, Palestinians in the Gaza Strip have been protesting as part of a campaign demanding the right of return for Palestinian refugees to the areas they were forcibly expelled from in 1948.

Since the protests began on March 30, Israeli forces have killed at least 108 Palestinians in the coastal enclave and wounded about 12,000 people.

The bloodshed in Gaza contrasted with the events in Jerusalem on Monday, as US President Donald Trump's daughter, Ivanka, and son-in-law, Jared Kushner, joined Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in inaugurating the US embassy.

Images broadcast on television and splashed all over the internet and social media underlined the sharp visual disparity of the two news events.

 Monday was the deadliest day for Palestinians since the Israeli war on Gaza in 2014, a 50-day assault that saw at least 2,251 Palestinians killed. Most of the fatalities were civilians, including 551 children. At least 73 Israelis were also killed, 67 of whom were soldiers.

This was the deadliest day in Gaza since the 2014 war. pic.twitter.com/IYDLV7rMcg

— AJ+ (@ajplus) May 15, 2018

"The hospital smells like blood, there is blood everywhere," Maram Humaid told Al Jazeera from the Indonesia Hospital in the northern Gaza Strip. "Those wounded are lying on the floor - there are no more beds to accomodate them. The hospitals are overflowing." #Gaza

— Nadeem Muaddi (@nmuaddi) May 14, 2018

Also on Tuesday, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas called on residents across the occupied West Bank to hold a general strike in honour of those killed in Gaza.

Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan led international condemnation of the deaths, accusing Israel of "state terror" and "genocide", according to state-run Anadolu news agency. 

Erdogan has declared three days of national mourning in honour of those who were killed.

In the US, Bernie Sanders, former Democratic presidential candidate and senator from Vermont, urged Washington to bring the adversaries together "to address Gaza's humanitarian crisis and stop this escalating violence".

Over 50 killed in Gaza today and 2,000 wounded, on top of the 41 killed and more than 9,000 wounded over the past weeks. This is a staggering toll. Hamas violence does not justify Israel firing on unarmed protesters.

— Bernie Sanders (@SenSanders) May 14, 2018

Jeremy Corbyn, Britain's opposition leader and head of the Labour Party, also joined in the condemnation of the violence in Gaza, saying: "We cannot turn a blind eye to such wanton disregard for international law".

In a post on social media, Corbyn wrote that his party is committed to reviewing the UK's arms sales to Israel "while these violations continue".

"The international community must at last put its collective authority and weight behind achieving a lasting settlement that delivers peace, justice and security for both Israelis and Palestinians, who have waited so long to achieve their rights."

The killing of dozens of unarmed protesters and wounding of many more by Israeli forces in Gaza, on the day President Trump moved the US embassy to Jerusalem, is an outrage that demands not just international condemnation, but action.https://t.co/qUDmcDe2xv

— Jeremy Corbyn (@jeremycorbyn) May 14, 2018

In response, the Trump administration said Hamas, the Palestinian group governing the Gaza Strip, was to blame for the violence.

In a social media post, Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch, said that "by blaming solely Hamas for the Gaza border killings, Trump gives the Israeli snipers a green light to keep killing".

Zeid Ra'ad al Hussein, the high commissioner of the UN human rights office, said that international law on the use of force appeared "to be ignored again and again".

"It seems anyone is liable to be shot dead or injured: women, children, press, first responders, bystanders, and at almost any point up to 700m from the fence."

.@UNHumanRights condemns the appalling, deadly violence in #Gaza yesterday during which 58 Palestinians were killed and almost 1,360 demonstrators were injured with live ammunition by Israeli security forces. pic.twitter.com/rn1bztRLMS

— UN Human Rights (@UNHumanRights) May 15, 2018

Inside Gaza, residents and activists have also made their collective voice heard on social media against the Israeli occupation and the latest violence.

As the protest raged on Monday, Mohammed Said Nashwan, a Gaza-based social activist, wrote in Arabic that Jerusalem is "the eternal capital of Palestine, and always will be".

"I swear the bloodshed will not be in vain."

#القدس_عاصمة_فلسطين_الأبدية ستبقى وستظل

والله لن تنعموا بها كثيرا

والله هذه الدماء لا تضيع هدرا
والله سيأتي اليوم الذي ستعود فيه #القدس لأهلها

لا يهمنا المتخاذلين من حولنا

— محمد سعيد نشوان #فلسطين (@MohamdNashwan) May 14, 2018

On Tuesday, the UK government called for an independent investigation into the deadly Gaza protest.

Philip Luther, of the human rights group Amnesty International, said in a statement on Tuesday that the killings of Palestinian protesters were "a violation of international standards, in some instances committing what appear to be wilful killings constituting war crimes".