Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) led a procession on Wednesday of around 20-25 Highlanders that started under the Rivera archways and wrapped around the Bell Tower to honor the International Day of Action for Palestine. The event was organized in tandem with other protests around the world rallying to call for an end to the Israeli occupation of Palestine.
“We wanted to stand in solidarity with all the other student activist on all the other universities around the world to show that they’re not alone … that we’re all standing together for the same cause.” said A’isha Saleh, film production major, and SJP member who spearheaded the procession.
Students held up various signs that read “Anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitism” and “Familia means nobody gets left behind or occupied, militarized, or forgotten,” amongst other things, to express solidarity with different social injustices like the disappearance of 43 student teachers in Ayotzinapa, Mexico and police brutality in Ferguson, Illinois.
Saleh felt that it was important to express solidarity with other calls for justice “because there are so many intersectionalities within the struggles.” She highlighted a student who held up a sign for United Students Against Sweatshops (USAS) and her experience as an immigrant saying, “Her experience with checkpoints, with borders, with soldiers who treat her less than human is exactly the same experience of a Palestinian when being oppressed by the [Israeli government]. There is an interconnection with how people of color are being treated all around the world.”
The National Day of Action comes amidst unrest in the Israel-Palestine conflict that has claimed the lives of eight Israelis and 40 Palestinians in the past month alone.
