By The Daily Illini, October 8, 2025

Demonstrators from several community organizations gathered at Alma Mater Friday afternoon to protest the Israeli military’s seizure of the Global Sumud Flotilla. The GSF is a 42-boat, international civilian humanitarian aid effort attempting to deliver supplies to Gaza and break Israel’s blockade of the widely-destroyed territory.

Speakers from several groups spoke at the event, including Champaign-Urbana For Palestine, Urbana-Champaign Jews for Ceasefire, Students for Justice in Palestine, C-U Muslim Action Committee and the Young Democratic Socialists of America.

“About 40 boats and less than 500 people, through a nonviolent way, have brought worldwide attention to the plight, to the horrors going on in Gaza, to the genocide in Gaza,” said Al Mytty, co-coordinator for the Illinois branch of World Beyond War — an organization seeking to abolish all wars — in an interview with The Daily Illini.

Among the 462 people on the flotilla is Jessica Clotfelter, a Marine Corps veteran from Windsor, Illinois, and Swedish political and climate activist Greta Thunberg.

The campus protest was part of a string of international demonstrations that erupted in support of the GSF and in opposition to Israel’s blockade of Gaza. Amnesty International and a United Nations panel previously said the blockade was illegal.

In Italy, whose military initially sent navy ships to escort the fleet, hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets Friday, going on strike in support of the mission.

Sharon Monday, former teaching associate and instructor in ACES, read a statement from her nephew, Paul Reid, who Monday said is on one of the flotilla’s vessels.

“They are going to try to portray me as a terrorist, that I’m violent,” Monday said in a speech, reading from Reid’s letter. “I don’t wish ill against anyone (who) is Jewish or Christian or Muslim or any religion. I am nonviolent, and they have been very clear on this mission that we are not to resist with any violence to any act they commit.”

Bryan Maxwell, visiting assistant research scientist at the Illinois Sustainable Technology Center and representative of CU for Palestine, criticized the United States’ support for Israel’s military campaign and, specifically, Illinois’ direct investment in Israel.

Michael Frerichs, the Illinois state treasurer, has invested $95 million of state funds into Israeli bonds, according to a March press release. Frerichs wrote that Israel is one of the U.S.’s “most important allies” and that Illinois has invested in its bonds since the 1950s.

“The state with the largest Palestinian-American community in the country is one of the biggest purchasers of Israel bonds in the country, and that’s shameful,” Maxwell said in a speech.

A representative from the campus chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine, which had its RSO status revoked by the school in late 2024, criticized the University’s investment in companies that supply weapons to Israel.

A 2024 investigation by The DI found the University had invested more than $27 million into such companies and Israel bonds in 2023.

“The (University of Illinois) Board of Trustees finances the death of Palestinians with our tuition dollars,” the SJP representative, who did not share their name, said in a speech. “We do not rest until every dollar is divested, until the occupation falls and until there is only one state, and that state is Palestine.”

As several organizations have called on the University to divest from weapons companies and fossil fuels, the school has taken a broadly anti-divestment stance.

“There is little evidence or research indicating that divestment or other exclusionary strategies meaningfully achieve the goals of such campaigns,” wrote Patrick Wade, director of executive communications and issues management, in an email to The DI. “By divesting, the investor seeking change loses any influence over the company’s direction, making it less likely that behavior will shift as intended.”

Four members of the University’s I-Team were present to observe the protest. The I-Team is nominally charged with monitoring campus events that “have the potential to be interrupted, disruptive or lead to adverse contact between parties due to conflict, particularly protests and demonstrations.”

After all the representatives delivered their speeches, the protest dispersed. Speakers ended by calling on the U.S. to end its support for Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, which has been called genocide by a UN inquiry, the International Association of Genocide Scholars and two Israeli human rights groups.

Israel’s foreign ministry and President Donald Trump have denied the genocide allegations. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the country could have committed genocide “in one afternoon” if it wanted.

“The United States should stop sending weapons to Israel,” Mytty said. “The United States should demand that Palestine be recognized as a state. The United States should demand equal rights for the people of Palestine.”

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