Chicago, IL – 150 Chicagoans banging pots and pans gathered near Trump Tower to protest the Gaza genocide, July 26. It was the third Chicago protest held in a single week in response to the ongoing genocide and famine against Gaza.

“I ask every single one of you here and everyone on the sidewalk, even the police if you have a heart, open it and let what you hear shake you to your core,” said Sami Elmuti with the US Palestinian Community Network (USPCN).

“The people of Gaza see you standing here today, coming to these events and demonstrations and being the voice for the voiceless,” said Dr. Hasan Hammo, who had returned from Gaza to Chicago after working at the Khan Yunis hospital. “I can tell you that everything you’re seeing on social media is true and worse than what it is depicted as, I am here to offer eyewitness testimony, to show you what Western media is trying to hide.”

In spite of the atrocities, Dr. Hammo affirmed that “there is hope with you standing here, and with the people of Gaza. They want every single one of you to come back when it is rebuilt and stronger to show you their thanks.”

“It can feel hopeless, but there is hope, and that is in the steadfastness in resistance of the Palestinian people,’ said Kobi Guillory with the Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression. “Oppressed people in the U.S. and elsewhere have to match that steadfastness, we have to put our bodies on the line for Palestine and shut down the system that is committing genocide.”

Guillory endorsed putting pressure on local Zionist officials, such as U.S. Representative Sean Casten and State Treasurer Michael Frerichs, who have invested Illinois tax dollars in the occupation of Palestine.

“The reason the Zionists are doing this to our people in Gaza is because they are losing,” said Nashwa Bawab, an organizer with the Palestinian Youth Movement.

Bawab said the U.S. is responsible for starving the people of Gaza because the Zionist entity could not conduct any of its genocide without the United States. She also stated, “now every complicit Arab government is starving Gaza too,” sharing growing sentiment against the complicity of governments such as those in Jordan and Egypt.

“We have to raise the ceiling of what we can do for our own humanity; this is not a test for Gaza, it is a test for us,” Bawab declared before the protesters marched through downtown.

Some shoppers joined the march or chanted along from the sidewalk. Many took flyers with further calls to action, such as this divestment petition: bit.ly/awcdivest.

#ChicagoIL #IL #AntiWarMovement #Palestine #USPCN #ChicagoAWC