Two thousand people mobilized in Chicago the same day, marching to the Federal Building to condemn the Israeli brutality against the Palestinians and Washington's support for the regime in Tel Aviv.

Across the country, on college campuses, at street protests, and during sidewalk picket lines, these and similar actions drew the largest participation of supporters of the Palestinian struggle in many years. Young and spirited, they reflected the determination of the fight for Palestinian self-determination.

At the New York action a number of people said they decided to participate in the march after learning about it from television and radio; others joined as they saw it go by. Shah Jahn, a hotel worker in New York who was born in Bangladesh, was one of those who helped bolster the demonstration. He printed a sign that read, "Israel should give them back the land, Palestine should have peace," and told Militant reporters that "the Palestinian struggle is a struggle for land and they live in such humiliation and fear every day, they have nothing else to lose." Many others also carried their own placards. One read, "One country with equal rights for all."

Around 1,000 people held another protest on the same day at Union Square in midtown Manhattan. The previous day, thousands turned out for protests in Manhattan and Brooklyn. "Israel, you should know, Palestine will never go," chanted protesters in Times Square. "We don't have anything against Jews as Jews, only the Zionists who kill Palestinians," said Abdul Ali, a 22-year student who joined the rally at Brooklyn's Borough Hall.

The protests sparked discussions among participants and observers. The New York Times reported that workers "leaving Midtown office towers lingered in Times Square longer than usual" during the April 5 rally there. "I came to see what the message was and to see who was participating," said Sattara Lenz. "I would like to see people stop killing each other, and I need to know more."

While many motorists honked their support and pedestrians waved encouragement to the protesters, others made their disagreement known.  
 
Pro-Israel mobilization
On April 7 some 10,000 people gathered near the United Nations to declare their support for the Israeli offensive. Radio personality and Guardian Angels founder Curtis Sliwa told the crowd, "Israel's battle is our battle. We are as endangered as they are. We'll soon have suicide bombers here in New York." Two days earlier prominent capitalist politicians in New York had joined a protest outside the Palestinian mission. City Council speaker Gifford Miller said that Israel's "fight is our fight as well. This is our battle for freedom from terrorism." Governor George Pataki described Palestinian suicide bombings as "not martyrdom" but "murder."

Actions in defense of the Palestinian national struggle have occurred in many cities. Hundreds and sometimes thousands of people have turned out for actions in Atlanta; Dearborn, Michigan; Houston; Los Angeles; San Francisco; northern New Jersey; Columbus, Ohio; Philadelphia; Seattle; Washington, D.C.; and elsewhere to express their solidarity. As in New York, Palestinian immigrants, many of them young, have frequently played a leading role in the protests.

On April 5, 500 people rallied in front of the Bricker Federal Building in Columbus, Ohio, in an action organized by the Muslim Student Association and the Committee for Justice in Palestine. The day before, more than 500 people gathered outside the Israeli embassy in Washington carrying signs and banners reading, "Israel out of the occupied territories." The protest followed by less than a week a solidarity march of 3,000 people in the capital.

According to the New Jersey Star-Ledger, a coalition of mosques and Muslim groups coordinated protests involving hundreds of people in the northern New Jersey cities of Paterson, Jersey City, and Teaneck. The paper described the police presence as "heavy, with Passaic County sheriff's officers filming the protest from a rooftop and black-clad federal security agents watching from atop the federal building." Participants in the New York protests noted a large and aggressive police presence as well.

Laura Anderson in New York, Janice Lynn in Washington, D.C., and Paul Coltrin in Columbus, Ohio, contributed to this article.
 
 
Related articles:
Washington: End all aid to colonial-settler Israel!
Mass protests greet Powell in Mideast
Palestinian struggle for self-determination  
 
 
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home