Muslim Women’s Club Stands in Solidarity with Palestine
Staff Reporter
October 16, 2023
On Thursday October 12, the VIU Muslim Women’s Club held a peaceful protest with over 50 participants on the Nanaimo campus. The protest aimed to educate people about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the wake of Hamas’ surprise attack on Israel October 7th, killing 1139 Israelis.
VIU students and faculty joined the protest to ask questions and learn more about what’s happening in Gaza and Israel from the perspective of Palestinian university students.
Club Communications Officer Rania Alsalloum, 19, said some in attendance were not aware of the facts of the attack as reported by national and international media. “During the rally…people ask[ed] what happened. We were surprised because the events have been a huge part of the media recently.”
Four members of the club are Palestinian and two are from Gaza. “All we can do right now is just support and then share, educate people about what’s going on….A lot of people that came to the protest asked questions, and we just answered, ” says Alsalloum.
Co-President Sara Kishawi, 22, said, “When you have that sense of community, you feel more confident in going out to speak about these things that are happening…because you have people that are backing you up.”
Kishawi emphasized the importance of community especially during a time of rampant misinformation. “For us to have this community when the majority of people are being miseducated and misinformed about a situation and in turn, making them turn against us, is very important. We found a lot of that support through the Muslim Women’s Club from Muslim and non-Muslim women.”
Co-President Lamia Bayan, 21, said, “There’s not a lot of Muslims around campus. It’s a good community for all of us to come together and just share our struggles.”
Much of the misinformation surrounding the Israeli Palestinian conflict has to do with the polarization online. VIU professor of Political Studies Mark Williams teaches courses about Middle Eastern politics.
“Highly left-wing progressive groups are empathizing with the Palestinians, unable to empathize with the Israelis. I think that the same is true with the conservative media, where they’re able to empathize acutely with Israeli suffering, but not have that same empathy necessarily for the suffering of Palestinians,” says Williams.
Williams says this “is a reminder of just how irreconcilable this conflict is, and maybe this is one of the reasons why it does inflame the passions and lead to such polarization…. Maybe that is a symptom of just how elusive a sustainable and realistic and practical peace agreement really is between the Palestinians and the Israelis.”
The club plans to do a second event similar to the Stand in Solidarity with Palestine Protest in November with details to follow. “We want to bring in Palestinian speakers to talk about their experiences and educate people,” says Kishawi.
The VIU Muslim Women’s Club was founded in February 2023 to create a safe space for Muslim women on campus. To date it has hosted a fundraiser bake sale for victims of the September 8th Moroccan earthquake, and put on a Hijab and Henna evening where guests could try on traditional Muslim headwear and donate to get a temporary henna tattoo.
The Muslim Women’s Club invites women of all faiths to join them in future efforts to work for change.
