Updated: Oct. 12, 2023, at 11:43 a.m.
Community members gathered in Kogan Plaza on Monday evening in a demonstration and vigil organized by leaders of GW for Israel to honor the lives lost in the Palestinian militant group Hamas’ attacks on Israel.
About 150 community members embraced one another as speakers shared feelings of profound pain for the lives lost and friends missing in the war during speeches, prayers and a subsequent candlelight vigil. The event, whose speakers included officials, professors, rabbis and students, followed rallies on the National Mall and White House on Sunday for Palestine and Israel, which some students attended.
Israel declared war on Hamas on Sunday after militants launched a surprise attack on Israel that included mass kidnappings and rockets Saturday – the day after the close of the Jewish holiday Sukkot, a weeklong celebration commemorating the fall harvest. In response, the Israel Defense Forces are carrying out a “complete siege” of Gaza. More than 1,200 Israelis and at least 1,100 Palestinians have been killed, with at least 150 Israeli civilians taken hostage.
The United States and European Union have long designated Hamas as a terrorist organization.
Daniel Schwartz, a history professor who specializes in modern European and American Jewish history, said Jewish people should have been celebrating during Simchat Torah from Friday to Saturday, one of the most festive Jewish holidays commemorating the beginning of a new cycle of Torah readings but that he could not sing and dance, as is tradition, because of the Hamas attacks. He said the attacks on Israel were a pogrom — or an organized massacre of an ethnic or religious group, typically the Jewish community — the likes of which have not been seen since the Holocaust.
“I’m reminded this weekend that the very fiber of my being is bound up with the welfare of the state of Israel and Jews all around the globe,” Schwartz said in a speech.
He said the only event in Israel in his life that has caused such shock and grief was when a Jewish extremist assassinated Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995.
Schwartz said he has been publicly critical of the current Israeli government and believes the creation and expansion of settlements has been a “moral and logical disaster” for the country. He said he has been dismayed by recent social media posts attacking Jewish people and added that people shouldn’t believe all Palestinians support Hamas’ attacks.
“I have been distraught by the social media posts of many who champion human rights that have blind spots when it comes to the Jewish people,” Schwartz said.
Schwartz compared the idea of a shared humanity that transcends partisan, national and religious divides to a “dot on the horizon” that is continually receding. He said attendees are called upon to keep sight of the dot.
“We pray that God grant peace, goodness, kindness and compassion upon us and upon all Israel,” Schwartz said. “We resolve to keep working for the day that the Prophet Isaiah’s vision of a world in which nation will not lift up sword against nation, and never again will they learn war. When that day will be realized. And we pray it comes soon.”
Rabbi Levi Shemtov, the director of Chabad GW, said the people attending the demonstration, including many who criticized Israel in the past, are showing they are with Israel and the Jewish people in the face of the “subhuman” actions of Hamas. He then led the group in reciting the Shema, the centerpiece of the morning and evening Jewish prayers, and a psalm.
“The behavior that they’ve witnessed was just so awful and beyond the pale of any human endeavor,” Shemtov said in a speech.
Colette Coleman, the dean of students and vice provost for student affairs, also attended the demonstration. During a speech, she said she shares the feelings of many people at the vigil, like those who are hurting and scared, despite feeling like she is watching the events unfold from a distance as a non-Jewish person.
“I want to be here, our administration wants to be here, to be able to lift you up as we go through this time,” Coleman said in her speech.
Noam Kara, the Israeli fellow for GW Hillel, said in a speech that before she arrived at GW about two months ago, she worked in music festival production in Israel. She said many of her friends were at the Tribe of Nova music festival near Re’im on Saturday, where more than 250 attendees were killed by Hamas militants.
She read a poem in Hebrew to remember the lives lost at the festival and other Israelis who Hamas have killed since Saturday.
“May they rest in peace,” Kara said.
Shani Glassberg, a junior and an Israeli American, recounted her experience texting friends in Israel before the attacks began and how the conversations morphed from friendly banter to panicked messages asking for confirmation that her friends were alive. She said she discovered Sunday that the Israeli military had deployed her father as well as her friend who is on the front lines of the war.
“I sent him, ‘Send me a sign of life when you get a chance,'” Glassberg said in her speech, regarding a text she attempted to send her deployed friend. “The message was never sent. Will I ever see him again? I don’t know.”
Glassberg said the vigil is a space for community members to mourn the loss of their friends and family, the Israeli towns that have been reduced to rubble by the violence and the war’s genesis.
“Israel has faced many things, and we are still here, standing and alive,” she said.
Sophomore Sean Shekhman, a member of Alpha Epsilon Pi, and sophomore David Delarosa, a member of Zeta Beta Tau, wrapped their arms around each other as they spoke about the importance of standing united as members of the only two Jewish fraternities on campus.
“Even though we come from different brotherhoods, we are forever united by our Judaism and our love for our homeland of Israel,” Shekhman said in a speech.
Dylan Lyman, a senior and member of AEPi, said the demonstration was a positive moment for Jewish community members to come together, share emotions and feel a sense of belonging with each other. He said he hopes students and other community members on campus see that the Jewish community on campus is united and supportive of each other and that others will support them as well.
“I’m obviously still extremely sad and upset for what’s happened over the weekend and what’s currently happening, but there was a bit of warming in my heart to what was going on and to see everyone together and coming together like this to support each other which helps,” Lyman said.
Jared Hoffman, a first-year studying political science, said his family friends who traveled to Israel stayed their first night in a bomb shelter because of Hamas’ attacks. He said although he knows no one living in Israel, he feels a connection to the country because he is Jewish.
“It’s really devastating to see how a lot of people, regardless of whether they’re Jewish or not, seem to have some sort of affiliation with this,” Hoffman said.
Community members wrapped up speeches with prayers and songs in Hebrew, swayed to the Israeli national anthem and lit candles for those who were killed in the attacks as dusk turned to dawn in Israel.
This post was updated to correct the following:
The Hatchet incorrectly reported that Schwartz said Israelis could not sing or dance this weekend to celebrate Simchat Torah. He said he could not sing or dance. We regret this error.
