On the one-year anniversary of the Hamas-led attacks in Israel — the deadliest day in the history of the country — a group of students from Brown and RISD stood in the rain hanging an installation in honor of the Oct. 7 victims. The members of the Brown RISD Hillel wanted to mark the somber occasion.
The attacks left more than 1,200 dead in Israel and sparked a wider war in Gaza, where more than 40,000 have died. In Providence, and thousands of other communities across the globe, the events of the tumultuous year have been top of mind for many. Hundreds of pro-Palestinian protesters marched through Providence over the weekend.
Rabbi Josh Bolton, executive director of Brown RISD Hillel, said the students he works with process the events in different ways. Some of the students are grieving, while others want support for pro-Jewish or pro-Israel advocacy work.
“I think that there’s still many, many students who are still trying to understand the meaning of October 7th,” Bolton said. “There’s the notion of ‘October 8th Jews:’ That the day after October 7th, many, many Jews across America on campuses and elsewhere woke up to a sense of their Jewish identity and their Jewishness in a way that they perhaps had not yet ever felt before.”
Bolton spoke with The Public’s Radio afternoon host Dave Fallon about how his campuses marked Oct. 7.
This interview was conducted by The Public’s Radio. You can read the entire story here.
