Pro-Hamas and anti-Israel protests are set to reignite across U.S. universities Tuesday as activists mark the second anniversary of Hamas’s Oct. 7 terror attack—an event they now call part of a “righteous decolonial struggle.” The planned demonstrations will test whether the Trump administration’s tougher policies against campus anti-Israel protests have curbed the kind of antisemitic unrest seen in past years.
At UCLA, Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and UCLA Divest announced a “floral procession to honor and remember the lives stolen by the Zionist state.” The groups described Hamas’s massacre as Palestinians “righteously engaged in decolonial struggle,” and urged attendees to wear masks.
The University of Michigan’s SJP chapter will protest “against two years of genocide,” accusing Israel of being a “terrorist state” while ignoring the 1,200 Israelis killed by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023.
Columbia University students are joining an off-campus rally organized by Within Our Lifetime (WOL). Flyers for the event display a red upside-down triangle—Hamas’s symbol for Israeli targets—alongside the slogan “STRIKE MARCH RESIST.” Other New York “targets” include the Israeli consulate, Trump Tower, and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s home.
At George Mason University, students plan to “BREAK THE BUTCHERS” and at George Washington University, organizers called for a “prayer and commemoration of our martyrs.”
With protests spanning Yale, Penn, Stanford, and others, campus administrators will face scrutiny over whether they allow these anti-Israel protests to again spill into antisemitic intimidation.
