IUPUI students and community members are camping out on the downtown Indianapolis campus to protest the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza as well as Indiana University’s response to protests in Bloomington.
Four campers showed up under the skyway of the Kelley School of Business on April 26. By April 29, the group had grown to 14, with more students, faculty and community members joining during the day.
“This is an uprising for the students,” said Layth Abdulbari, an IUPUI junior and one of the encampment organizers. “We’re just trying to show solidarity with Gaza.”
The Indianapolis encampment was organized by students with the support of local grassroots organizations Indiana Resiste and the Central Indiana Democratic Socialists of America. Since the campout started, students have formed the Palestinian Solidarity Committee at IUPUI.
But it’s also part of a movement that has engulfed the country, as college students nationwide protest the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza and demand that their universities break ties with Israel. At Indiana University in Bloomington, 56 people — including students — have been arrested since April 25 for trespassing, according to reporting from the Indiana Daily Student.
Indiana protesters — including IUPUI students — have a list of demands that include the resignations of President Pamela Whitten, Provost Rahul Shrivastav and Vice Provost Carrie Docherty.
Students also are demanding that IU end its partnership with the Naval Surface Warfare Center, Crane Division — a naval facility in Bloomington — and sever all financial ties with Israel.
Indiana University spokesperson Mark Bode did not immediately respond to a request for comment for this story.
Indianapolis ‘liberated zone’
A sign at the edge of the encampment on IUPUI’s campus welcomes visitors to the “liberated zone,” one of the many protest messages in the area.
Because it’s the first day of finals week, many students are studying on their laptops at tables, sharing a power strip.
“We’re creating a place where we don’t need to rely on campus services to do academics,” said Abdulbari, 20.
That doesn’t just include studying. There’s a bookshelf with titles that range from revolution theory to Star Wars paperbacks. Community organizations have donated piles of food, toiletries and supplies. There’s also donated tents, where the campers have been sleeping since the weekend.
The war is personal for Abdulbari. He’s Palestinian and has family in Gaza who’ve been killed and displaced by the war.
“I feel so much grief,” he said. “It’s hard to even do these types of things and organize. But it’s a matter of, I have to be there for my family. I have to defend them in any way I can.”
Other protestors, too, are trying to combat feelings of hopelessness. Joreylis Fillon, a 21-year-old IUPUI junior, found out about the encampment from Snapchat and came out around noon April 28.
She wanted to feel like she was doing something to make her voice heard, even though Gaza is thousands of miles away.
“Honestly, if I were at home, I would just be doom scrolling,” she said. “There’s only so much you can do as college students in America, being so separated from the issue, but what we can do is what we want to do.”
Eli Housman, a 22-year-old IUPUI student, helped set up the camp the first morning.
“I often think about if people were to ask me what I did, and I had to think back and say that I did nothing, I would regret it forever,” Housman said. “I have the capacity. I have the ability. I have the privilege to be out here and support my community.”
Claire Rafford covers higher education for Mirror Indy in partnership with Open Campus.
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