Palestine college student protest megathread

[Progressive Pessimist]

I think it's a matter of young minds' idealism. I was there once.

To them, Israel is "the establishment." In some sense, that's true, but it also ignores Israel being victimized too, historically, in many ways. It's a very long, complicated, nuanced conflict and that doesn't translate well into a protest.

Nobody is holding up signs that say: "Two-State Solution! Down with Hamas and Netanyahu!" even though that's probably the most rational way to look at the crisis.

[Progressive Pessimist]

I don’t care whether you think Israel’s actions in Gaza are justified or not. The actions and conduct of these protesters has been straight up despicable and you should be ashamed of yourself if you’re still supporting them.

They're certainly not doing their cause any favors.

It seems to be a trend in this country where protests don't really evoke sympathy or support in our society, and often fuel the reverse.

See also: the George Floyd protests.

[Progressive Pessimist]

I don’t care whether you think Israel’s actions in Gaza are justified or not. The actions and conduct of these protesters has been straight up despicable and you should be ashamed of yourself if you’re still supporting them.

They're certainly not doing their cause any favors.

It seems to be a trend in this country where protests don't really evoke sympathy or support in our society, and often fuel the reverse.

See also: the George Floyd protests.

Mitt Romney supported the George Floyd protests.

Early on. And I supported, and still do as well. But that summer of protests did little more than empower the "law and order" crowd.

[Progressive Pessimist]

The protestors want Trump to win. You don't have to take my word for it; take theirs. I hate that I have to root for the protests to end, because what's happening in Gaza is not okay.

There's barely anything happening in Gaza right now, and this has been frustratingly true for well over a month now.  Fewer than 1,000 people died in the last month.  Everything is on pause (some might even call it a "cease fire") because most of Hamas is holed up in Rafah and Israel isn't ready to go in yet.  Now is possibly the least urgent time of concern for Gaza.

The children of Gaza are watching you, college students.  They are listening as casualties are still occurring in Gaza.

How are the children of Gaza watching these protests when I was told one of Israel's main genocidal acts was cutting power and internet access for the Gazans?  The same people doing these protests assured me that Israel was going to block everyone in Gaza from the internet so they couldn't broadcast evidence and testimony of Israel's brutal acts of ethnic cleansing.

I think these protests are increasingly a movement "against the system". Aid for Israel and their war effort may just have been the trigger. We saw a similar pattern with anti-Covid protests, that later on were no longer about the pandemic policies.

Israel has become synonymous with "establishment." I really think that's increasingly the root of all this more than anything. The conflict isn't being looked at as the complex, decades long conflict it is with a lot of grey area to it.

[Progressive Pessimist]

FIU student asks at a hearing, “are we, anti-Jewish students, not worth protection?” Oops.

https://twitter.com/henmazzig/status/1788245458248446071?s=61&t=aUnV_wcn5XeE...

Yikes! I hope she misspoke there and meant to say "non-Jewish."