Pro-Palestinian students march over the Massachusetts Avenue bridge after walking out during the OneMIT Commencement Ceremony at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, Massachusetts on May 30, 2024. (Photo by Joseph Prezioso / AFP) (Photo by JOSEPH PREZIOSO/AFP via Getty Images)
More than 100 graduates walked out of commencement at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on Thursday, the latest campus stress related to the Israel-Hamas war.
An outdoor commencement ceremony at MIT in Cambridge was disrupted for 10 to 15 minutes when some graduates walked out. Wearing keffiyehs, the checkered scarves that represent Palestinian solidarity, over their caps and gowns, they chanted “free, free Palestine” and held signs that said, "All eyes on Rafah.”
“There is going to be no business as usual as long as MIT holds research projects with the Israeli Ministry of Defense,” said David Berkinsky, 27, who earned a doctorate degree in chemistry and walked out. “There are no graduates in Gaza. There are no universities left in Gaza left because Israeli has bombed every single one.”
Eesha Banerjee, a 20-year-old from Birmingham, Alabama, who received her bachelor’s degree in computer science, engineering and physics and walked out, said she wants to pressure MIT to become a better place.
“It wouldn’t feel right taking the degree without making clear to the administration and corporation that we still want the demands to be met. We are still watching what the administration does,” she said. “We want to send the message that this movement will continue. Students are still standing for those ties to be dropped.”
Banerjee said she never questioned her decision to leave commencement.
“While I’m still here, I want to use every chance I can to push this institute to be better,” she said. “I want MIT to be the institution that it can be, and it can’t be that until it drops its ties, drops its complicity.”
Some people at the event were upset by the disruption, swore at the protesters and yelled, “Good riddance to Hamas terror fans.” A pro-Palestinian encampment at MIT was cleared by the school on May 10.
Protest camps sprang up across the U.S. and in Europe this year as students demanded their universities stop doing business with Israel or companies that they say support its war in Gaza. Organizers seek to amplify calls to end Israel’s war with Hamas, which they describe as a genocide against the Palestinians.
