A public meeting titled ‘Bridging the Divides’ was interrupted by a small group of ‘pro-Palestine’ protestors on Monday November 17th. The protest of roughly 15 masked people formed a block outside of the meeting’s room, with chants of “free Palestine”, “arms off campus”, and “Zionists off campus”. But what, exactly, were they protesting?
The speakers at the meeting were bereaved Palestinian and Israeli activists from a peace organisation called Parents Circle. Ibrahim Al-Jaafari, the Palestinian speaker, lost his 19-year-old cousin Jihad, who lived in Dheisheh Refugee Camp and was shot and killed while standing on the roof of his home as Israeli soldiers raided the camp.
Despite the nature of the event, the protesters attempted to block the doors to the event and shouted at attendees in an attempt to shut down the event. Though they failed to stop the meeting and silence its speakers as intended, the protesters succeeded in frightening those in attendance, including a Jewish speaker who chose to not attend in person over concerns for their safety. As they were leaving, the aggressive protesters snatched leaflets from a student attendee trying to talk to them and tried to grab and pull the student in a short scuffle.
A graphic promoting this protest labelled the event as being run by Standing Together, calling them a “liberal Zionist organisation”. But who are these “Zionist” hosts the protesters decried?
Friends of Standing Together, who co-organised the event with the BNBR centre, campaign in solidarity with Standing Together, an Israel based peace movement of Jewish and Palestinian citizens of Israel. Standing Together actively campaign for a ceasefire and end to the genocide in Palestine.
Standing Together regularly call Israel out for its genocidal campaign in Gaza, demonstrate at the Gaza border by blocking troop transports, organise nationwide protests and strikes demanding a ceasefire, and more.
The graphic also decried the Israeli speaker as a “settler”. Mai Albini Peri lost his uncle Danny on October 7th and his grandfather Haim was kidnapped. Haim and his friends from the Kibbutz survived in captivity for four months until they were killed. Peri has chosen to explicitly contest the politics of nationalist revenge by standing publicly with bereaved Palestinians and speaking out for peace. Many of his compatriots consider him a traitor to Israel; to “pro-Palestine” activists in Sheffield he is simply a “settler”.
The politics on display by the protesters on the 17th were some of the worst found in the Palestine movement. They acted on the belief that any interaction with Israelis who want peace normalises the actions of the far-right Israeli state, instead of strengthening the anti-war movement. They claim to be acting in support for Palestine, but how can the attempted shutting down of a meeting addressed by a bereaved Palestinian peace activist in any way support such a cause? The fact that people would put their energy into intimidating people attending such a meeting is obscene and unjustifiable.
If you want to help in seeing an end to the war, join and support your local Friends of Standing Together group.
