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About 70 Ann Arbor residents lined Baker Road in Dexter Friday to protest President Joe Biden’s visit to Ann Arbor, expressing their disapproval of the Biden administration’s support for Israel’s ongoing military campaign in Gaza. Biden visited Scio Township to speak at the United Association Local 190 headquarters, where he signed a pro-labor executive order.
In an interview with The Michigan Daily at the protest, Salma Hamamy, a University of Michigan alum who served as the president of U-M student organization Students Allied for Freedom and Equality last year, said she hoped that the protest would send a message to the Democratic Party.
“This not only shows that we’re abandoning Biden but also that we’re abandoning the Democratic Party as a whole so long as they’ve abandoned their conscience,” Hamamy said.
The crowd started gathering on the grass outside a gas station parking lot at 3 p.m. to protest the weapons shipments the Biden administration has sent to Israel. Protesters planned to march the half mile from the gas station parking lot to the union training center at about 4 p.m., but when they started their march, they were stopped by police.
Police parked their vehicles up the side of the street, blocking protesters from walking toward the UA headquarters. In an interview with The Daily, event organizer Mariam Abutarboush, a member of American Muslims for Palestine, said she was upset by the police response.
“We’re not out to get anybody, we’re not out to cause any harm,” Abutarboush said. “We just want to be heard.”
While the protesters were unable to reach the UA training facility, they remained in the area until Biden left Ann Arbor.
In an interview with The Daily, Ali Allam, LSA Student Government vice president, said he believed the turnout at the protest indicates the level of disappointment in the administration’s funding of the Israeli military.
“I think it’s a great turnout,” Allam said, “I think people are definitely fed up by this administration’s unconditional support for this apartheid state, a state the (International Court of Justice) has already acknowledged is plausibly committing genocide, a state that for 70 years has been participating in an illegal occupation by the UN’s standards.”
Hamamy said Biden’s exit from the presidential race is not enough to address the impact of his decision to continue military support for Israel.
“We are here to make it very clear that it doesn’t matter if he is about to exit out of office, his legacy is going to be marked by the war crimes he helped fund and commit,” Hamamy said.
Daily Staff Reporter Ava Chatlosh can be reached at chatlosh@umich.edu.
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