Update: April 26 at 5:20 p.m.
At the encampment, The Daily Illini interviewed Jaden Andrews, senior in Media and member of Zeta Beta Tau, a Jewish-founded fraternity on campus. Andrews identifies as Jewish.
**This interview has been edited for clarity.**
The Daily Illini: Can you talk a little about why you’re here today?
Andrews: Their goal here is really to intimidate the people here.
I really believe that’s why they’re congregating. This is really to scare off the Jews on campus and make them feel like they’re not welcome here. I’m here alone. I don’t care. I’m Jewish, I’m proud, and I’m here to show that they’re not going to silence our voices just being here.
DI: How do you feel about all the protesting going on around campus?
Andrews: I mean, I think it’s absolutely appalling. There’s a reason that they’re doing it during the holiday of Passover. Protestors had one of their largest marches on one of the first nights of Passover, just like they did at Columbia University, where they literally bartered people into their homes and did not allow Jews to celebrate Passover in the way that they should, which is having Passover Seder.
So for us, I mean, this has happened for hundreds and thousands of years, and the Jews have always been tested. We’re really here to show that we’re stronger than ever.
DI: Do you see any sort of, you know, collaboration between groups or any hope of, you know, resolving any issues on campus to make tensions easier?
Andrews: I mean, at this point, it seems like one group is a little more extreme than the other. In my opinion, I think open dialogue is the most important thing in any conflict. I think that’s how anything gets solved. (It) is through finding a middle ground and having sort of an open discussion.
And I’ve done that with students on campus, but there’s people that are here screaming at police, screaming at students.
I’ve already been here for three minutes and been called a Jew and screamed at and called derogatory terms. And so I don’t feel like that’s going to happen at this moment, but I would love for that to happen.
DI: Do you have anything else you want to say on the topic or anything you feel is important that I didn’t mention?
Andrews: The main message is not to the opposition in this case, but really to Jews: Keep being yourself and keep being proud to be Jewish because our voices have been silenced for so long and I don’t believe that we should let that happen.
