People gathered at UC San Diego on Wednesday, March 6 to call for a ceasefire in Gaza. The large crowd was mainly made up of students.
The group Students for Justice in Palestine organized what they said would be the biggest protest in the history of the campus.
Various speakers called for Israel to get out of Gaza and accused the Jewish state of genocide. One speaker with the group Jewish Voices for Peace said criticizing Israel and its actions does not mean one is antisemitic. Some counter protestors shouted in opposition.
Karen Parry is the executive director of Hillel of San Diego, a group that supports Jewish students at major universities in the San Diego area. When asked what question she'd pose to the protestors at UCSD she said: “I would ask, 'What does dialogue look like? What does finding opportunities to build bridges look like?' We’re all in this world together and I think there are true opportunities to connect and I wonder what that would look like.”
In response, a protestor that didn't want to be identified said: “I would love to come together and work towards creating a bigger Jewish Voices for Peace because peace is something important to all of us. We already started working with members, the new org on campus, and I’d love to make it bigger and work more together.”
The organization she referred to is the new chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace at UCSD.
After various speeches, many students prayed before setting off on a march around campus.
Several speakers also said that they support a demand from the Associated Students of UCSD to not spend any of its roughly $7 million budget on companies that support Israel.
