Jewish students in tears at Palestinian ‘resistance’ rally at University of Washington: ‘They want us killed’
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Jewish students at the University of Washington were left terrified and in tears when hundreds of their peers held a “Day of Resistance” rally for Palestine — advertised with an image of a paraglider like those used by Hamas terrorists in their mass slaughter of Israelis.
Video showed a student tearfully begging an administrator to stop the rally at the university where an alum is among the more than 1,300 murdered by Hamas at the weekend.
“They want our people dead. They want us killed,” she sobbed to a school official, who said there was nothing he could do as hundreds clapped and banged drums.
“How are you allowing this? Why aren’t you putting a stop to this?” the student asked as tears rolled down her face.
“They want us dead … Just please end it. Please.”
Other videos posted online appeared to show opposing students in a shouting match, with one student saying Israel is “finished” — and another calling a pro-Israeli student a “f–king rapist.”
Campus security had to break up a couple of these minor clashes, according to KOMO.
The pro-Palestine rally was advertised online by a student group that said its goal was to “uplift the just Palestinian resistance,” and “condemn the settler colonial state of Israel.”
Organizers said they do not support Hamas, but rather support Palestinians defending themselves.
However, flyers for the event featured a drawing of a paraglider, similar to the ones that Hamas used to fly into southern Israel over the weekend to launch their surprise attack on civilians.
“We are here to uplift the Palestinian right of return and land back,” Bissan Barghouti, who spoke at the rally, told Fox 13. “We believe in their self-determination.”
It came just days after University of Washington alum Hayim Katsman, 32, was among those murdered by Hamas.
He was doing research on a kibbutz, when he was found murdered in his apartment.
Some Jewish students also said they have family in Israel, including Nina Carmeli, whose relatives were killed by the terrorists.
“[They] went missing for four days,” she told Fox 13. “They were found on Tuesday murdered.
“I don’t know if it’s OK to come here and say that you’re pro-resistance, when that resistance is killing your own people, as well as the people in Israel,” Carmeli, who has dual US-Israel citizenship, said of the rally Thursday night.
“I have family that’s gone,” she continued. “Like, it’s OK to want change, to want peaceful change, to want development, progress. But it can’t come as a result of rapes, of people being beheaded, of kids dying. It can’t be a result of that.”
Over the past few days, students and parents have reached out to the Chabad at the University of Washington “frightened,” Rabbi Mendel Weingarten told KOMO.
“The students are having a hard time processing it,” he said. “They’re definitely feeling lonely, and with all of the additional threats locally, they’re feeling insecurity.
“We’re here to help them with the loneliness and the security,” the rabbi said, adding: “Almost every student there has a first or second-degree connection to someone who was either murdered, missing or is fighting on the front lines.”
Some students now feel afraid to wear their Star of David necklaces or yarmulkes, freshman Anna Yekhilevsky said, and are upset with what some consider a lackluster statement about the war by the administration.
“The terror, loss of life and outbreak of war in Israel and Gaza over the weekend, which began with the reprehensible attacks by Hamas, is devastating to all of us, and my heart is with every member of our community who has ties to or loved ones in this deeply troubled region,” President Ana Mari Cauce said on Monday.
“The tragic reality is that civilians have borne and will bear the brunt of this violence. In their attacks, Hamas has killed hundreds of civilians and taken scores more hostage. And many more in Israel and Gaza continue to die as the violence escalates.
“Every life claimed by this conflict is a tragedy.”
Student Aidan Dveirin told KOMO that the statement “breaks my heart.”
“If I could speak directly to the president, I would just tell her that your both-sides-ism, your tiptoeing is personally making us hurt,” student Aidan Dveirin said.
“If you think that speaking up right now is genuinely speaking on behalf of the people, you’re deeply, deeply misguided,” he said. “These attacks are fully from the root of annihilating the Jewish state.
“Hamas has no interest whatsoever in the well-being of the Palestinian people. There are innocent lives that are going to be used as human shields,” Dveirin said.
“This isn’t about freedom, this isn’t about land rights, this isn’t about occupation,” he continued. “This is about right and wrong.”
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