Gaza protestors picket outside of Met Gala 2024
Pro-Palestinian protestors demonstrate against the war in Gaza at Hunter College in New York on May 6, 2024.
While celebrities are putting on their best for the Met Gala, protestors are hitting the picket lines.
Protesters in support of Palestinians amid Israel’s war in Gaza made their voices heard outside of the Met Gala.
Students from Hunter College, roughly a mile from the Met Gala, marched with signs calling for their university to “divest” funding. “We will not stop, we will not rest,” the students chanted, per videos shared by reporter Katie Smith on X.
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In another video they chanted, “There is only one solution.”
One user on X shared a photo of protestors walking through Central Park and toward the Met Gala.
The protests come a week after hundreds of students attending universities in New York City such as Columbia University, New York University and SUNY’s Fashion Institute of Technology have ramped up organization efforts to get their institutions to cut financial ties to Israel and Israeli companies, especially those benefiting from the ongoing war in Gaza.
Protestors were refueled as Israel’s ongoing war escalated on Monday. Israel moved forward with a planned assault on the southern city of Rafah despite Hamas declaring they had accepted a Gaza cease-fire proposal from Egypt and Qatar.
The militant group said its chief, Ismail Haniyeh, had informed Qatar’s prime minister and Egypt’s intelligence chief of its acceptance of their proposal. The announcement came hours after Palestinians were warned to evacuate parts of Rafah as Israel prepared for an attack certain to worsen an acute humanitarian crisis.
While the student-led demonstrations have not led to any divestments, the week of protests has had broad impacts, including forcing classes to move online, limited access to school campuses, arrests of students and disruption of graduation ceremony plans.
The dayslong demonstrations have centered on the war in Gaza that was triggered by Hamas’ incursion into southern Israel on Oct. 7, when about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, were killed and more than 240 people were taken hostage.
Israel then launched a massive military campaign against Hamas and the resulting bombardment and ground assault has killed more than 34,000 Palestinians, leveled large swaths of Gaza and caused a humanitarian crisis that’s left the population on the brink of starvation.
Contributing: Joey Garrison, John Bacon, Christopher Cann, Clare Mulroy, Eduardo Cuevas, Minnah Arshad and Jeanine Santucci, USA TODAY
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Gaza protestors picket outside of Met Gala 2024