University of Maryland reverses decision to allow anti-Israel protest on October 7

The University of Maryland reversed its decision to allow an anti-Israel protest on the first anniversary of the October 7 massacre, following backlash from local Jewish groups.

UMD Students for Justice in Palestine and UMD Jewish Voice for Peace had been set to hold their October 7 vigil for Gazans killed in the Israel-Hamas war at the campus’s Mckeldin Mall, but the University System of Maryland (USM) said in a statement on Sunday that on the day of the Hamas-led pogrom it would limit campus events requiring permits or approval to those supporting “a university-sponsored Day of Dialogue.”

“From the beginning of the war, we have come together as a University System to urge that we use this moment to encourage conversation, compassion, and civility; to engage with one another across our differences and draw on our shared humanity and our shared values to bridge what divides us,” said USM. “These dialogues aren’t new.

Many of our universities have been hosting this kind of programming for several months. Reserving October 7 gives us a chance to continue these urgent conversations and to mark this solemn anniversary in a way that gives students – all students – the time and space to share and to be heard.”

USM said its intent was not to infringe on the free expression and speech of students, but to be sensitive to the needs of students as October 7 was a “day of enormous suffering and grief for many in our campus communities.”

UMD Jewish Student Union, Maryland Hillel, Terps for Israel, and Israeli American Council Mishelanu at Maryland welcomed the USM decision and thanked UMD leadership in a joint social media statement on Sunday.

Jewish groups condemn cancelled vigil

“October 7, the largest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust, is a day of mourning for the Jewish and Israeli community,” said the UMD JSU. “We are relieved that SJP will no longer be able to appropriate the suffering of our family and friends to fit their false and dangerous narrative.”

The Jewish groups said that it was distraught that the decision to only hold university-sponsored events had to be made at all, and wished to use the campus space to “grieve together as a community” to promote unity at the university. The unideal situation was necessary, according to the Jewish groups, to ensure the physical and psychological safety of students on the day of mourning.

UMD JVP and SJP attacked the decision to cancel the event, claiming that the vigil for Palestinians killed since the October 7 massacre was attacked without familiarity with the content. The anti-Israel groups said the discourse was “the continuation of inherently racist, Islamophobic, and dehumanizing rhetoric surrounding Palestinians.” JVP and SJP said the actions against their event were an attempt to paint “Muslim, Arab, and anti-Zionist Jewish students as barbaric.”

The anti-Israel groups asserted that their vigil for Palestinians who died in the war was no threat to the campus’s Jewish community, but conflation of Zionism and Judaism did threaten UMD and the Jewish community.

“To claim that Palestinians cannot hold a day of remembrance in mourning one year of genocide, or lay claim to that date is an insult to every life lost in the Zionist entity’s genocidal campaign,” UMD SJP and JVP said on Instagram on Sunday. “The disproportionate scale of suffering experienced by the Palestinians over the past year necessitates their remembrance and our solidarity on this day. The suffering of all innocents killed must not be monopolized and necessitates a fair and just representation.”

SJP and JVP demanded the right to organize and exercise their right to free speech, accusing Zionists of attempting to stifle Palestinian voices.

The organizations indicated on their Sunday Instagram post that they still planned to hold their all-day event at Mckeldin Mall, and on Monday a link to register is still active and listing the campus building as the rally location.

UMD Jewish groups said they would be holding their own event at the Maryland Hillel to memorialize the victims of the October 7 pogrom.