Groups of protesters gathered in downtown Portland Saturday afternoon to rally against the Israeli-Hamas war, and America’s role in the conflict.

According to the Portland Press Herald, the rally started in Deering Oaks Park, and eventually made its way over to the nearby University of Southern Maine campus.

The event was organized by Maine Labor for Palestine and Maine Students for Palestine and called for a permanent ceasefire in the conflict. The event was peaceful, contrasting similar protests across the country recently that have led to more than 2,000 arrests on college campuses in the past few weeks.

Among the speakers at the event was Green Party presidential nominee Jill Stein, who was arrested last weekend during a protest in St. Louis for allegedly assaulting a police officer. Stein has denied the charge, saying that she was assaulted with a bicycle, thrown to the ground and zip-cuffed while she was being arrested.

“How can it be that it is deemed antisemitic, that it is deemed hate speech, to say what the (International) Court of Justice said, that this is a plausible genocide being carried out by the state of Israel,” she said. “That is not antisemitism and that is not hate speech.”

Emma, a USM graduate who still had her gown on while being interviewed by the Press Herald, details her horror regarding recent protests and police action.

“I graduate today, and I think about Gaza. I think about how there are absolutely no universities left in Gaza. How over 14,000 children will never reach graduation because of oil, land grabs and deep-seated racism,” she said.

The Israeli Health Ministry says that the country’s counter-offensive has killed more than 34,000 Palestinians in the Gaza strip since the October 7th terrorist attack that left 1,200 Israelis dead.

 

To read the original Portland Press Herald article, click here.