By Lauren Campbell, Staff Writer
Originally Published May 1, 2024
On Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas—an organization described by The Council on Foreign Relations, PBS News, and other sources, as an ‘Islamist militant movement’, and designated by the U.S State Department as a terrorist organization in 1997—launched rockets at Israeli communities from the Gaza strip, killing an estimated 1,200 people and taking 200 hostages. This resulted in a declaration of war by the Israeli government, who then launched multiple aerial strikes on Gaza. Although the government claims it was intending to defend itself from Hamas, according to U.S News, more than 33,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza as of April 15.
As the conflict has continued and the death toll has risen, people across the U.S and across the world have argued over the morality of the conflict, particularly Israel’s response to the original attack. In recent months, students on college campuses have taken up protests to disrupt both campus and community life to draw attention to the conflict, whether in direct protests in support of Palestine, or in counter-protests supporting Israel.
Given the state of the conflict and the tense debate being had, some students at Saint Vincent College (SVC) do not feel the Israel-Palestine conflict has been discussed enough on campus.
On Wednesday, April 3, a student-run discussion was hosted to debate and spread awareness of the ongoing conflict between Palestine and Israel. The discussion was hosted by Tia Epps, senior Sociology major, and Jacqueline Moon, junior English major, along with other students passionate about this topic. They both emphasized how important it is for campuses like SVC to stay educated and informed about conflicts and issues like this, despite its small size.
“We wanted to host this event to have an open discussion amongst students about the ongoing crisis in Gaza,” said Epps. “We noticed that this conflict was not being discussed amongst the Saint Vincent Community, despite the tragic images and news stories that have flooded social media since October. As students, I believe it’s important to discuss social and moral issues and how our country responds to these events.”
Along with Epps and Moon, students Mason Gage, Tanner Wilkinson, and Bec Ulmschneider, all worked on a zine titled “Students for Peace”, which consists of articles written by the students about the genocide of Palestinians. The zine includes direct citations and statistics, opinion pieces, and suggestions on how to get involved. Epps emphasized the importance of zines to spread awareness, citing their use by the Black Panther Party. Moon highlighted the contributors and their inputs for the zine.
“It was important to me that we made something physical that students could walk away with about the genocide after the event, so that’s what gave us the idea of making the zine,” said Moon. “We all worked together to think of topics to write about and made a list of about 7 or 8 article ideas to pick through. As we got closer to the event, each writer picked a piece that they felt drawn to and wrote from there. Tia, Mason, Tanner, and Bec all wrote extremely insightful articles.”
Moon explained that Epps's Anatomy of a Genocide is the heart of the zine and conveys the main message they wanted to get across. Gage, in addition to his article on the Catholic Church’s perspective on the genocide, designed the zine and took care of the organization and technical details.
The discussion was a success; students held a respectful and mature discussion about the issue. Epps and Moon hope to hold another discussion about this topic, along with another issue of “Students for Peace”.
“I would love to host more student-run events and open discussions like this as they are much more absent than they should be on this campus,” said Epps. “We hope to hold another discussion on the genocide of the Palestinian people before the end of this semester.”
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