(Boston Orange) More than 1,000
people rallied through Boston downtown to South Bay Detention Center on evening
of July 2nd, demanding elected officials to close camps at border, defund ICE
and CBP, and provide permanent protection for all undocumented immigrants,
refugees, and asylum seekers.
This group of people includes
Jews, immigrants and allies, marched from the New England Holocaust Memorial through
downtown Boston to the South Bay Detention Center. 18 of them were arrested shutting
down the entrance of the South Bay Detention Center.
One of the protester is Michaela
Caplan, a Jewish American whose family was heavily affected by the Holocaust
and the intergenerational waves of trauma that followed. He said that his being
there is first and foremost that he is a Jewish American, and then his family was
heavily affected by the Holocaust and the intergenerational waves of trauma
that followed.
Michaela Caplan says “I grew up learning not just about the
Holocaust but what led up to it— years of increasingly violent rhetoric and
dangerous dehumanization of the Jewish people. I learned about the millions of
people that looked away as mass atrocity grew and crystallized. To me, never
again does not only mean fighting dehumanization and terrorizing of entire
communities; it means fighting apathy and bystanderism. Never again is now.”
The protestors sang Jewish
prayers of healing and mourning to grieve for those who have fallen ill or lost
their lives because of ICE and CBP’s inhumane policies.
18 of the protestors were arrested shutting down the
entrance of the South Bay Detention Center.
“This is Judaism in action,” said
Jaclyn Friedman who was arrested blocking the steps to the detention center.
Organizers of the protest says, “today,
eleven million immigrants and asylum-seekers across the United
States are subjected to physical and psychological abuse by our own government.
This crisis isn’t just happening at the border, but in our neighborhoods and
communities here in Massachusetts and across the US. Many of our congressmen
who have spoken out against the concentration camps voted last week to give ICE
more funding. We cannot become numb and paralyzed by the depth of these
atrocities and human rights abuses - we must take action on a massive scale”.
According to a statement provided by protest
organizers, this action comes following a protest on Sunday in Elizabeth, NJ
where 36 young Jews were arrested for stopping business as usual at the
Elizabeth Detention Center (Newsweek, JTA, Teen Vogue), and in tandem with protests
happening this week across the country. 18 activists blocked an ICE detention
center in Central Falls, RI, and more actions are planned: in Los Angeles on July 3rd, in Philadelphia on July 4th, and in San Francisco on July 5th. They demand dignity and permanent protection for all immigrants
and migrants and safe pathways for those seeking refuge from places beleaguered
by colonialism and violence. They also demand an end to detention and the
abolition of ICE. As Jews, they’ve seen
this before. They know how it ends. It is their duty, both as Jews and as moral
human beings, to stand up and take action. They will not stop until the camps
are closed.
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