DeKALB – Using the “Huskie Pride” sculpture as their platform, a crowd gathered Thursday in support of Palestine.
At approximately 1:10 p.m. a crowd of about 30 people gathered. Students took turns sharing their stories or addressing the death tolls and violence in Gaza.
People in hoodies, coats and scarves could be seen holding Palestinian flags, flyers and homemade signs saying “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” “Stop Funding Genocide” and “Cease Fire Now.”
As classes let out, the crowd grew to roughly 70 people.
“We are here to bring awareness to the situation in Palestine,” said Matcha Mitchell, a sophomore time arts major. “We’re here to sort of disrupt the peace and get people to sort of be out of their comfort zone and hope that they can educate themselves.”
Several students held “Boycott Starbucks” signs. Mitchell advised against boycotting the Starbucks in the Holmes Student Center.
“We need to understand that people working that Starbucks (in the Holmes Student Center) are our fellow students, and those are people’s friends or people probably living off of that money,“ Mitchell said.
Dyeato Paye, a senior Spanish major, shouted for advocacy for the victims of the war.
“We all have to stand up. We all have to speak up,” Paye said. “When you’re watching TikTok, when you’re eating food, when you’re about to get access to water, remember the people in Palestine, remember how they have to even negotiate gettin f— rainwater, f— rainwater that falls from the sky.”
Paye had seen news about the protest on a friend’s Snapchat story. She ended her speech chanting “free Palestine” and waved to the crowd to follow along.
Sarah Salem, a junior elementary education major, came to the protest looking for NIU voices talking about the war. Salem has Palestinian family in the West Bank and said she struggles knowing she’s safe from the conflict.
“It’s that sort of thing where you’re just like, you don’t even know how to feel. You’re just so consumed with guilt almost – that’s the big emotion that I felt,” Salem said.
The crowd dispersed at 2:06 p.m.
The event was organized by Seth Morgan, a first-year theater and nonprofit and NGO studies double major.
“For turnout honestly I did not expect as many people today,” Morgan said. “Tomorrow there’s a lot of people from around DeKalb coming as well.”
