Dr. Nick Maynard, of Oxford University, whose appearance at Ohio State was recently cancelled by the university, met with a group of about 50 students outside of the Thompson Library on Friday.
Dr. Maynard discussed his experiences treating bomb victims and children in Gaza in a speech organized alongside the OSU chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine.
In his speech, Dr. Maynard gave praise to students for standing up and speaking out against the conflict in Gaza.
“You've shamed everyone, and you should be very proud of that. So don't be silenced. Do speak out and do continue to speak out loud. You must march, you must protest. You must fight, boycott,” Dr. Maynard said.
Faisal Shawar, a second-year biology student, said it’s important to allow people like Dr. Maynard to speak because of their first-hand experiences of being in Gaza.
“It's nice to just get other people to talk with and obviously, most of us who came here agree with him, but it's also...I can only see so much from my phone. I can't see the day in and day out things that these people have to live with, and he has,” Shawar said.
Shawar also said it’s up to the students to make a difference as he feels students are the only consistent voices who put pressure on university officials and President Ted Carter.
“There's no pressure outside of, like, the students to really tell them no, like, don't cancel it, or things like that," Shawar said. "And I can, we can all come and complain, but the only person he really cares about himself and him, or Mike DeWine or Trump or anything.”
Additionally, Shawar also feels the university and the country have been pushing back against justice, with not allowing Dr. Maynard to speak being another example of this.
“But I feel like a lot of the stuff that OSU, specifically, President Carter and the rest of the country, as a whole, has allowed, and kind of pushed back against justice, whether civil rights or just normal rights,” Shawar said.
Overall, Shawar said it’s nice to know that people who aren’t Palestinian, including Dr. Maynard, support their cause.
“It's honestly just to show that he cares, and like other people care, and we're not necessarily alone, whether it's students or Arabs or Palestinians or people,” Shawar said. “And obviously he talked about Palestine, but it's also like we're all in this fight together. Regardless of who you are, what you are, we all have the same goal.”