Students and community members gather at ODU to show support for Palestine
NORFOLK — Several dozen Old Dominion University students and community members gathered Wednesday evening across the street from campus, hoisting signs and flags as they chanted their support for Palestine and called for peace in the region.
Like the protest Tueday evening at Christopher Newport University, the event remained peaceful. It was advertised as a May Day cookout in a flyer circulated on social media. The flyer said there would be “Food, Face Painting, Art, Music, Raffle, Palestine Solidarity” — and it continued past 10 p.m.
Holding signs that said things such as, “Food Not Bombs for Gaza” and “Silence is Complicity,” the group of about 75 was led in chants by a demonstrator shouting into a bullhorn. Some drivers who passed by honked horns in support.
“Gaza, Gaza you will rise,” the group chanted. “Palestine will never die.”
The protest was one of many held at college campuses across the country over the past few weeks. Some have grown violent, and hundreds of activists have been taken into custody since the first arrests were made April 18 at Columbia University.
Police arrested and pepper-sprayed attendees at a pro-ceasefire sit-in and encampment at Virginia Commonwealth University earlier this week. At Virginia Tech, 80 people were arrested, including 53 current students, according to The Washington Post.
About a dozen Norfolk police officers stood by on bicycles and on foot as Wednesday’s protest was carried out in front of Chartway Arena on Hampton Boulevard. Wednesday was the last day for exams at ODU, and graduation ceremonies will be held Friday and Saturday.
ODU student Faisal Alkhatib, 19, was among the leaders at Wednesday’s demonstration.
“There are people from all sorts of backgrounds here,” Alkhatib said. “Anyone who believes that Palestinians deserve to live and deserve a future is here…All we want is peace.”
Jane Harper, jane.harper@pilotonline.com
