SEATTLE — A student walkout is planned for Tuesday at colleges and schools across our area in protest of the Israeli war in Gaza.
It's something that has members of our area's Jewish community concerned.
"We support the right to protest and free speech in the United States, but when that crosses into antisemitism, that has the potential to do real harm to Jewish students," said Solly Kane, Jewish Federation of Seattle president.
Recent months have seen pro-Palestinian protests shut down Interstate 5 for hours and block the entrance to Sea-Tac Airport.
While Kane supports the right to peaceful protests, he worries they can be taken too far.
"When people start calling out 'all Jews' or when they start calling out 'Zionists' who are people who believe Jews have the right to have some state in their ancestral homeland, that's antisemitism," Kane said.
There were the most incidents of antisemitism in America in 2023 since the Anti-Defamation League started keeping statistics 45 years ago.
There were 8,873 -- a 140% increase from the previous year -- that's 24 per day across the country.
Washington had the most incidents in the Pacific Northwest with 190 -- up from 65 in 2022.
The Jewish Federation claimed one of the groups behind Tuesday's protest is a group called Samidoun. The Federation said the group has been banned in Germany for its connections with terrorist organizations.
While not calling any local protesters terrorists or antisemites, Kane worries about the radicalization of young minds.
"These protests and walkouts feel very grassroots when, in fact, they're not," Kane said. "They're highly organized and coordinated."
It isn't lost on Kane that the planned protest happens on the first day of Passover -- a week of celebration for Jews.
He hopes people can set aside political differences and agree on one thing.
"We're looking for people of good conscience to be our partners and allies in calling out hate and calling out antisemitism," Kane said.