Protesters rally for Palestine at UK: ‘The students have awoken’
More than 100 protesters rallied on the University of Kentucky’s campus Wednesday, denouncing the violence that’s killing Palestinians and urging policy changes by UK and American officials to call for a halt to Israeli attacks.
The protest follows protests, encampments and even the seizure of a campus building in New York City by those angry about the war in Gaza.
The conflict was sparked on Oct. 7 when about 1,200 people in southern Israel were killed and more than 200 taken hostage in the Hamas-led attack.
Israel’s retaliation has been extensive in their effort to flush out Hamas terrorists through bombing runs and land assaults. The violence that has claimed more than 34,000 Palestinian lives, many of whom are civilians, international medical and relief organizations have estimated.
Local civic group Lex4Palestine and a group of UK students and alums, the UKY coalition for Palestine, hosted Wednesday’s protest.
“Our mission is to be on the right side of history, to stand with our students and with our peers and our academic integrity of education. We’re amplifying voices,” Lex4Palestine protest organizer Kareem Hassan said.
As universities across the nation see protests against the the war, some people have asked what good a protest in America brings people in Palestine. Ala Hassan, an organizer with Lex4Palestine, said voices in places like Lexington and on campuses across the country will travel far overseas.
“What we see happening in Palestine directly affects us. Whatever we do here in the states, directly affects what happens in Palestine. What happens here on our campuses, directly affects Palestine and so we have a say and we will be loud,” she said.
“We are not going away.”
Protesters demand divesment in Israel
Organizers demanded the university to:
Disclose and divest financial investments and ties to Israel and U.S. corporations that support Israel.
Cease all collaboration with and boycott Israeli academic institutions.
Ban Lexington police and and Kentucky State Police from campus.
Take concrete actions to support the rights of Palestinian students and professors.
Condemn Israeli’s ‘scholasticide’ in Palestine.
Ensure all students the right to academic freedom and peaceful demonstration.
UK spokesperson Jay Blanton said UK’s endowment investment holdings are not detailed by individual companies.
“Our expectation, given the types of funds that make up that portfolio, is that UK would have very little investment in companies from Israel, and no investment in the Palestine region,” he said.
Protesters also asked UK President Eli Capilouto to “make a statement on the ongoing US-backed Israeli backed genocide in Gaza and show support for the Palestinian community here on campus.”
Capilouto has not made a public statement on the war in Gaza, but he has addressed wars before. When Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, he issued a statement “standing in solidarity” with the people of Ukraine.
He also posted a web page with links to outside sources for students to do their own learning.
“We are a university and the root meaning of the word refers to being a community of teachers and scholars. At our core, we always believe dialogue and discussion lead to better, more sustainable answers than violence,” Capilouto said in the statement after Russia’s invasion.
“We will do our part by pointing people to resources where they can provide support to Ukrainians during a time of so much need, while we continue as members of a global community to push for peace.”
Student experience in the midst of war
Ben Bandy, a UK alum who graduated in 2022 and an organizer at Wednesday’s protest, said those in attendance denounced the destruction of Palestinian universities, of which 80% in Gaza have been destroyed, according to the United Nations.
The UN called it a ‘scholasticide,’ the systemic obliteration of education through the arrest, detention or killing of teachers, students and staff, and the destruction of educational infrastructure.
As a Jew, Bandy has been asked to defend his support of Palestine. To other members of the Jewish community, he said there is no justification for the destruction of the innocent.
“I am tired of having to justify why I am against the genocide. I am a Jew, and I am against the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people,” Bandy said.
Palestinian-American UK senior Iman Hassan, the president of UK’s Muslim student association, said her identity has been “challenged, belittled and attacked” over the past seven months.
“The University of Kentucky has utterly failed the Palestinian, Muslim and Arab communities on many occasions. Amidst the violence Palestinians are enduring at the hands of Israel, we have seen a dramatic rise in anti-Palestinian, Muslim and Arab hate crimes across American universities,” she said. “This violence has reached our community in Lexington long ago.”
Iman Hassan said students on campus have faced discrimination. In an opinion piece published at the university student newspaper, she wrote of her disappointment that Capilouto has yet to acknowledge the war in Palestine.
Ala Hassan encouraged people not to vote for President Joe Biden in the upcoming elections, to show that American leaders do not have them in a “chokehold.”
“The students have awoken. The population has awoken. America has awoken. The world has awoken to the atrocities that are happening in Palestine. It’s nothing new, but now our eyes are open,” she said.
“Our eyes are open and they will never be closed again.”
