By Sam Gauntt and Natalie Weger
Hundreds of University of Maryland community members gathered on McKeldin Mall Monday to honor Palestinians that Israel has killed in Gaza since Oct. 7, 2023.
This university’s Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace chapters hosted the “All Day For Palestine” event, which featured speeches from students and faculty members, teach-ins, an interfaith prayer and a vigil.
Monday marked one year since Hamas killed more than 1,200 people and took about 250 people hostage in its Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, according to the Associated Press. Israel declared war on Hamas the next day, and its military forces have since killed about 42,000 Palestinians in Gaza, the Associated Press reported Tuesday.
More than 500 community members attended the vigil toward the end of the event. As the sky darkened, speakers recited prayers and gave their final remarks.
One student spent eight minutes reciting the names of infants killed in Gaza to a silent crowd.
Some students spoke to the crowd about their personal connections to Palestine, including sophomore information science major Sarah Edwan and her sister. The sisters recounted the trauma their family endured in Gaza and its lingering effects after their immediate family moved to the United States.
Five of Edwan’s family members were killed in an Israeli airstrike in December 2023, she told the crowd. Her cousin’s three children, who were each under 5, had their “innocent lives extinguished in an instant,” she said.
“The weight of this loss is indescribable,” Edwan said. “Each name is not just a memory, but a piece of our hearts torn away, leaving wounds that will never fully heal.”
University of Maryland Police provided enhanced security measures for Monday’s event.
A metal barrier was placed around part of McKeldin Mall on Monday, and police officers were stationed by the area. Event staff searched attendees’ bags, used metal detectors and checked IDs at several entrances around McKeldin Mall that granted students access to the event.
“The safety and security of our campus community is, and will always be our top priority,” UMPD spokesperson Lt. Rosanne Hoaas wrote in a statement to The Diamondback. “In considering security needs, we take into account many factors, including the location of the event, specific activities planned, weather conditions and expected attendance.”
[Federal judge pauses UMD’s Oct. 7 event restrictions]
The event and increased security came after this university announced on Sept. 1 it would restrict all on-campus “expressive events” on Oct. 7 to university-sanctioned events.
In response, this university’s Students for Justice in Palestine chapter filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court of Maryland on Sept. 17 against this university, president Darryll Pines and the University System of Maryland Board of Regents. The chapter alleged the university’s decision violated students’ First Amendment rights.
This university’s decision to limit Oct. 7 events stemmed from “more angry, aggressive and violent” messages this university received in August, The Diamondback reported.
A federal judge last week granted Students for Justice in Palestine’s request for a preliminary injunction, which paused the university’s plan to restrict events on Monday.
Monday’s event helped comfort some community members, senior immersive media design major and event attendee Grace Orellana said, as many have felt “despair” after seeing the number of Palestinians killed by Israel grow over the past year.
Holden Zeidman, a Jewish Voice for Peace board member, told the crowd that it’s difficult to look at news headlines about Gaza because the violence has only gotten worse.
“I think it’s a good thing that we cannot process this, and more importantly, we cannot accept it,” the senior mathematics and secondary education major said.
Attendees flew white kites — often a symbol of freedom in Palestinian poetry and art — on McKeldin Mall during the event. Organizers also called for divestment from military contractors and expressed support for an immediate ceasefire.
The University System of Maryland Foundation, which controls the university system’s financial assets, did not respond to a request for comment.
Many students attended teach-ins from this university’s Students for Justice in Palestine, Jewish Voice for Peace and Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine chapters. The teach-ins highlighted Palestinian history, the use of Palestinian art as expression and the famine that people in Gaza face.
[Students for Justice in Palestine chapter sues UMD, USM for Oct. 7 event restrictions]
As faculty members spoke, some onlookers stood by and attempted to approach teach-in attendees. An event organizer interrupted faculty speeches to ask attendees to not engage if anyone “tries to argue” with them.
Nadine Sahyoun, a Palestinian American and nutrition and food science professor, spoke to the crowd during the Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine teach-in about her anger at the “bombs being sent over” to Gaza. Sahyoun read two poems to the crowd, including one written by Palestinian author Mahmoud Darwish in the 1960s to highlight how long “this massacre” has been happening.
About 700,000 Palestinians fled or were permanently expelled from their homes in 1948 during the Nakba — “catastrophe” in Arabic — because of the Arab-Israeli War after Israel’s establishment, according to the Associated Press.
“It’s been going on and on since 1948 and even before,” Sahyoun said. “I want to read [this poem] because I feel like it’s very appropriate in our mourning today, for all the people who have died.”
Abel Amene, a senior economics and physics major, said the security presence at the event was an example of “over policing.”
“Police officers are inherently antagonistic to our message,” Amene said. “These are all ways in which, through microaggressions like this, that our speech is suppressed.”
Sophomore environmental science and policy major Amelia Hans said though the security measures are important in preventing violence, they may have discouraged people from attending the event.
Fouad Ayoub, whose parents are Palestinian, said Monday’s event offered the campus community an opportunity to mourn together. Vigil attendees gathered with “good in their hearts [and] good intentions,” Ayoub added.
Ayoub has attended protests since he was about 11 years old, he said, but emphasized that there is a heightened importance of the current events.
“There’s a significance to this day — a year of genocide,” the senior aerospace engineering and computer science major said. “I think that’s what people should be trying to understand.”
Managing editors Lizzy Alspach and Olivia Borgula and editor in chief Apurva Mahajan contributed to this story.
