‘Free Palestine’ Protest Scheduled at UNR

The Globe received an invitation for a “Free Palestine” protest scheduled at University of Nevada Reno this Friday evening. (see below)

The student-led protest links to numerous organization and petitions who advocate for the boycotting, defunding and sanctioning (BDS) of Israel.

According to the a Jerusalem Post article from 2014:

Much BDS and pro-Palestinian NGO activity in Europe and the United States is connected to radical Islamic groups and Palestinian terror organizations such as Hamas.

Hamas and its parent Muslim Brotherhood organization fuel and direct international BDS and anti-Israel political activities on hundreds of university campuses across the United States via the Muslim Students Association.

One such organization featured on the invitation, Justice For All/Invest in Justice Coalition is comprised of the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights (USCPR), Adalah Justice Project (AJP), MPower Change, Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) Palestine Working Group, Eyewitness Palestine, Jewish Voice for Peace Action (JVP Action), & Palestine Institute for Public Diplomacy (PIPD).

Justice For All claims:

There is a global divide between those who believe in freedom and dignity for all and those who justify oppression and supremacy. The Palestinian struggle for freedom from Israel’s daily violence against our people and ongoing settler colonization of our land is part of a universal struggle for collective liberation.

Our work for freedom is rooted in the lessons of our elders to care for the earth, our people, and our heritage. We will not give in to injustice. We will not be erased.

Israel’s oppression of the Palestinian people is driven by Zionism, a political ideology that called for the building of a Jewish state in Palestine. To build this state, armed Zionist groups initiated their settler colonial project in our homeland and destroyed hundreds of Palestinian towns and villages, massacred our people, and drove us from our land. Today, Israel maintains an unjust political system of supremacy by denying Palestinians our basic rights and privileging Jews over non-Jews. Israel shares strategies with the U.S.’ own settler colonial violence against Indigenous people, as well as the U.S. government’s war against the poor and oppressed.

The UNR student organizer maintains that the protest is not sponsored by the UNR School of Social Work and is “student initiated.” The organizing students are “committed to aiding the Palestinian people who are in dire need in the face of war crimes and genocide. We are committed to a ceasefire, providing humanitarian aid, and freedom from oppression for the people of Palestine.”

Numerous protests on behalf of “Palestine” have erupted across college campuses. Some have been met with police force and marred with violence, anti-semitic and anti-US propaganda.

Today, after visiting Columbia University–the epicenter of pro-Palestinian demonstrations–House Speaker Mike Johnson posted on X (formerly Twitter), “Hamas backed these protests at Columbia. The things that have happened at the hands of Hamas are horrific, and yet these protestors are out there waving flags for the very people who committed those crimes. This is not who we are in America.”

Hamas backed these protests at Columbia.

The things that have happened at the hands of Hamas are horrific, and yet these protestors are out there waving flags for the very people who committed those crimes.

This is not who we are in America. pic.twitter.com/C14Vjb0YmI

— Speaker Mike Johnson (@SpeakerJohnson) April 25, 2024

The Globe will cover the event tomorrow and provide a follow up report.