On Nov. 9, Smith Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) staged a sit-in in College Hall to recognize the deaths of over 6,000 Palestinian civilians since the start of the Israel-Hamas war and to protest the college’s communications regarding the war. It came after the Oct. 25 walkout in support of Palestine and the Oct. 19 protest, both of which the SJP also helped to organize.
“SJP is not an organization on campus like other political organizations,” said Rania Shafi ’25J, a leader of SJP and sit-in organizer. “We don’t have a long-term agenda. We don’t have, you know, a list of goals that we want to accomplish. The majority of us are involved for deeply personal reasons, because we either have friends or loved ones or family who are in Gaza now.”
Thursday’s protest started in front of the Campus Center at 12:15. Students gathered, many of them wearing all black, as organizers unrolled an approximately 20 foot-long banner with the names of Palestinian civilians who have been killed since Oct. 7. The casualty lists that SJP used have not been updated since late October; Shafi estimates that the list contains only half of the true number of dead civilians. “And that’s not counting those who were not identified or were stuck under rubble,” she said.
Members of SJP began the protest with speeches in front of the Campus Center. “The Palestinian genocide is one that we must not simply observe but bear witness to,” said SJP member Rinal Dahhan ’27. “We must find the courage to bear witness to the cold-blooded murder happening right before our eyes.”
“We want to hold this [banner] and walk to College Hall, and tell Smith that this is a [expletive] genocide, not a response!” said another SJP leader and sit-in organizer Manar Alnazer ’26. This was in reference to President Willie-LeBreton’s Nov. 6 email, in which she made a statement on “the attacks by Hamas a month ago and Israel’s ongoing response.”
“Here’s the response. The response is 200 pages that we printed out, cut out, stuck to a long roll of paper, and read out for seven hours today, and barely finished it,” said Shafi.
Organizers called for silence on the walk from the Campus center to College Hall while protestors carried the banner down Elm Street and through the Grecourt Gates into College Hall. Once inside, they laid it on the floor and sat down in the foyer, where they remained for almost five hours. During that time, organizers and volunteers read the names of the dead. After every page, which contained 40 names, they asked the crowd, “Is this what you call a response?”
“No, it’s a genocide,” said the assembled students. “Call it by its name. We’ll call them by their names. Not numbers; names.”
“I think it’s important to come to these protests to show the college that people care and that it needs to be doing something differently,” said a junior who preferred to remain anonymous. “Sometimes the only way to get them to listen is to sit in front of their offices with a megaphone.”
People working inside the building, for the most part, did not engage with the protestors. A Campus Security officer helped to open the double doors to College Hall to accommodate the width of the banner and held the door for students as they came in and out of the building. Officers watched during the reading of names, but remained silent.
“We’ve been working towards getting the only institution we have influence over to support a ceasefire,” said Shafi. “If we can pressure Smith to start doing something, it may or may not catch. If people decide that this is a precedent to follow, they might do it. In the event that that happens, that is the only way that anything can change.”
At around 5:00 p.m., protestors were asked by Campus Security to leave the building by 5:15, which they did without issue. Some moved directly to the vigil held on Chapin Lawn afterwards. “I think we made our point,” said the same anonymous student, who stayed for the entire sit-in. “Now, let’s see what the administration does.”
“We know that Smith students are very impassioned and engaged and the College affirms the right of anyone at Smith to express their opinions and to make their perspectives known as guided by policies of the college, including Policies Concerning Freedom of Expression and Dissent and the Discriminatory Harassment policy,” said Carolyn McDaniel, the Director of Media Relations in the Office of College Relations in response to the Sit-In. “While students have the right to express their opinions, we encourage communication and dialogue in a thoughtful and respectful way, even when the conversations are hard and there are vastly different points of view.”
Antisemitism is a real issue that Shafi is said they are aware of, especially as it relates to SJP’s organizing. “There is no place for antisemitism in SJP,” she said. “Some of our board members, and our most valued members, are also members of the Smith College Jewish Community. And they would agree that there is no place for antisemitism in the entire struggle for a free Palestine.”
While SJP doesn’t have any concrete plans for future protests, they are not planning on stopping their efforts. “The prospect of disruptive action on a small-scale inside of a college takes me mentally directly to this is futile and stupid,” said Shafi. “But it’s not. It’s not futile and stupid, and you might be telling yourself that. I tell myself that all the time. But truthfully, we are walking ourselves into a dark, dark place individually if we choose to believe that small change cannot become institutional change, cannot become worldwide change. This is the important work.”
