USC Hillel, in partnership with other Jewish campus organizations including Chabad, the Shoah Foundation and Trojans for Israel, held a vigil Monday evening to honor the lives lost one year ago in the Hamas attack on Israel. Around 200 people attended the vigil, which took place at Hahn Plaza in front of Tommy Trojan.
“We try to turn tears into joy. We try to turn darkness into light,” Rabbi Dov Wagner, the director of USC Chabad, said in an interview with Annenberg Media before the event. “We’re going to talk about those we’ve lost and mourn for those we’ve lost, but we’ll also look with hope towards the future and pray for peace.”
On October 7, 2023, Hamas launched an attack on Israel, killing approximately 1,200 people and seizing more than 250 hostages. Over 41,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza according to the Associated Press. Vigils and protests have taken place around the world to honor the memory of the victims.
“We are grateful to stand shoulder to shoulder with the Jewish community to remember, to mourn and to hope for peace in our world,” USC Hillel wrote in an Instagram post promoting the vigil.
As the sun set by Tommy Trojan, Dave Cohn, the executive director of USC Hillel, took the stage, opening the ceremony and inviting student speakers to join him. Students, USC Chabad leaders and other community members crowded around the stage, many wearing Israeli flags and other symbols of cultural pride. Some attendees wore necklaces to commemorate the lives of those lost on October 7 and those held as hostages by Hamas. As the event unfolded, students, many with direct ties to Israel and the attack, shared personal testimonies.
Among these student speakers was Ella Echo, a junior studying intelligence and cyber operations, who shared the story of her brother’s best friend who was shot while attending the Nova Music Festival. She said he survived the attack and was found seven hours later, hidden under the bodies of his peers. Though he survived, many friends of hers did not, she said.
“Some of my friends were burned alive at their army bases while their last seen footage was blasted as a Facebook post,” Echo said. “This experience isn’t just shared amongst the Israeli people, it’s the experience of the international Jewish community as a whole. The interconnectedness of the global Jewish network has made this deeply personal for all Jews.”
Prior to the vigil, Dave Cohn explained that the losses from the October 7 attack are “not distant tragedies to most Jewish people.”
“It’s not getting any simpler, it’s not getting any more peaceful. That’s an incredibly difficult reality to cope with,” Cohn said.
Alongside the student speakers, attendees shared their experiences in interviews with Annenberg Media.
“Today is not about politics,” Clarissa Rosen, a sophomore cinema and media studies student and a member of USC Chabad and Hillel said. “It is not about the Israeli government, it is not about Netanyahu or Palestine. It is about honoring lives lost and remembering the hostages that are still in captivity.”
Since the attacks last year, the Israel Defense Force has waged war with Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Nearly 2,000 people have been killed in recent Israeli attacks on Lebanon, according to the country’s health ministry.
USC Students for Justice in Palestine, Divest from Death USC, Student Coalition Against Labor Exploitation at USC and Jewish Voice for Peace USC held a walkout earlier in the day.
While there was no organized counter-protest to the vigil, two onlookers chanted “Free, free Palestine” repeatedly toward the beginning of the event.
“I think the Jewish people that come together here honor life, and we honor our community, and that has been consistent throughout this whole time,” Mason Platt, a junior studying political science, said. “You’ll never see us chanting anything negative against the other side. We just are hoping for a peaceful future and are glad to support each other.”
Will Erens, a senior majoring in political economy and the vice president of advocacy for Trojans for Israel, emphasized that the vigil would not be a protest in an interview prior to the gathering.
“This vigil is a place of mourning and a moment in time, no matter your politics or what you view is happening in the Middle East,” he said. “These people suffered through an immense tragedy a year ago, and are coming together as a community to mourn that tragedy.”
Erens encouraged those who want to support Jewish students to research the October 7 attacks.
“I felt a lot last year that things were happening very quickly and that people weren’t taking stock and weren’t critically thinking about what they were doing,” Erens said. “Really think critically about what you say and do. Do some research on the events happening in the Middle East … and hone in on that, because I think it’ll make people come together.”