Omar Ibraheem looked over at WVU’s Woodburn Circle late Saturday afternoon with a smile and a nod.
It’s Commencement weekend at the state’s flagship university, and handfuls of parents were using iconic Woodburn Hall as a backdrop for photos of their sons and daughters in their graduation caps and gowns.
For the past several months, Ibraheem, a biology major and president of the school’s Muslim Student Association, has been dealing with a backdrop he’d rather not be dealing with: the grinding Hamas-Israel conflict.
Student protests that followed on numerous college campuses across the U.S. since have spilled into physical confrontations and the cancellation of commencement exercises altogether on some.
“We don’t want that to happen here,” he said, “but we do want people to notice us. We do want our voices heard.”
Voices were heard, as Ibraheem and around 60 people — students in the association and others from the community — chanted and marched down High Street for the protest.
“Free, Free Palestine!” went one, through a bullhorn that was passed around.
Other chants named-checked President Joe Biden, West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice and Joe Manchin, the Mountain State’s senior senator on Capitol Hill.
“Stop supporting Hamas!” yelled one man, but car-honks and waves of solidarity were the general response to the contingent.
Meanwhile, the assaults last October in southern Israel show the quandary of college students, Muslim and Jewish, on campuses on the other side of the globe.
Around 1,200 people died during the invasion by Hamas militants, and some 250 others were taken hostage.
Israel’s response has been fierce — nearly 35,000 Palestinians have died in counter-attacks, with about two-thirds of the victims being women and children, according to Health Ministry officials in Hamas-ruled territory.
Call that a wrenching amount of collateral damage, Ibraheem said.
In today’s international business climate, he said, college campuses may be fueling the conflict with their dollars — whether they realize it or not.
That’s why, with the marching and the chanting Saturday in Morgantown, also came the waiting.
The Muslim Student Association sent a letter Friday to WVU President Gordon Gee requesting a full disclosure of the university investment portfolio, particularly how it might pertain to any Israeli companies.
“Palestine has been under occupation and terror for over 75 years and today, that tragedy continues,” reads the letter, in part.
“Any funding or investments to companies that profit off Israel companies, or from the Palestinian occupation is a crime,” the letter continued. “It is our job as students to hold our universities accountable to any complicity.”
Earlier this month, university spokeswoman April Kaull addressed that concern, telling WAJR and West Virginia MetroNews that there are no such fiscal interests present on the cost ledgers of the school in Morgantown.
“As a state agency, West Virginia does not have any investments — Israel-related or otherwise,” she said in the story, which was also carried by this newspaper.
Meanwhile, the Muslim Student Association has given administration until this coming Thursday to respond.
If no such response is forthcoming, Ibraheem said, students will assemble again for another protest, and for as many as it takes after that.
“We’ll stay within the law,” he said, “but we’ll stand with our First Amendment rights.”
Ibraheem was born and raised in Morgantown, but his father came to the U.S. two decades’ previous, his son said, because of that Constitutional measure and other freedoms.
“I’m more ‘American’ than most people here. My father loves this country.”
So does Olivia Dowler. The student from Weirton who is studying history, Spanish and philosophy helped organize Saturday’s gathering — and she’s Jewish.
“You can’t kill tens of thousands of people in my name,” she said. “This isn’t a Jews-versus-Muslim issue. This is a humanity issue.”
