As communities across the country prepare to observe the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. holiday this weekend. to celebrate with events ranging from parades to prayer services, some will draw on the slain civil rights icon’s history of protest to demonstrate against the war in Gaza and draw attention. for the approaching US presidential elections.
The Monday holiday also marks 100 days since October 7, when Hamas launched an attack in southern Israel, killing some 1,200 people and taking about 240 hostage. Since then, more than 100 Israelis have continued to be kidnapped and more than 23,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s bombardment of Gaza, while global health organizations have warned of a worsening humanitarian crisis there.
Perhaps the most massive organized event of the weekend in the US will be held in the nation’s capital on Saturday – the March on Washington for Gaza, co-organized by the American Muslim Task Force on Palestine, made up of some of the largest Muslim organizations in the world. world. the US, along with anti-war and racial justice groups. The march is expected to start at 1:00 PM EST.
March organizers are calling on President Joe Biden to demand a permanent ceasefire and an end to violence against civilians in Gaza and the West Bank. They also call for the release of Israeli hostages and Palestinian political prisoners and an end to “American unconditional financial support for the Israeli military,” said Edward Ahmed Mitchell, AMTP media coordinator and deputy director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. .
A similar march held in November, the National March on Washington: Free Palestine, drew tens of thousands of participants from across the country. Some estimates suggested at least 100,000 attended.
The title of Saturday’s march is reminiscent of the famous 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, where King delivered his historic “I Have a Dream” speech atop the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. That history, as well as King’s outspoken opposition to the U.S. role in the Vietnam War toward the end of his life, is a guiding factor for organizers.
Mitchell, who called King’s legacy “multi-faceted,” said King spoke out even if it meant being vilified.
“He was considered un-American and called a traitor. Even the political establishment shunned him,” Mitchell said.
In 1967, just one year before he was assassinated, King gave his famous speech “Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence” at Riverside Church in New York City. After quietly opposing the Vietnam War for years, he took the public step to condemn it, linking racial and economic inequality in the US to higher military spending abroad.
“I was increasingly compelled to see the war as an enemy of the poor and to attack it as such,” King said in his speech.
King’s daughter, Bernice King, has said her father opposed anti-Semitism and would also have opposed the bombing of Gaza. Taking lives through retaliatory violence is not the strategy he would like to see today.
“There’s an opportunity for us to make a real breakthrough and get to real conversations and actions that will allow people in some part of the world to coexist,” Bernice King said in a recent interview from The King Center in Atlanta . where she is CEO.
She believes protests are crucial in difficult times. King just hopes that people in general will use nonviolent words and actions when invoking her father’s name.
“My father had a certain manner, tone and tenor in his protest. You know, your language and your speech have to be in line, not just the physical actions,” she said. “But if your language is violent, that’s not necessarily in line with Dr. King.”
The center will also hold a memorial service Monday at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, where the late civil rights icon was a pastor.
Federally observed since 1986, the holiday falls on the third Monday in January, which this year is Rev. King’s actual birthday. The minister, born in 1929, would have been 95 years old. This year also marks the 60th anniversary of the passage of the Civil Rights Act and the King’s Nobel Peace Prize.
Prominent Democrats will commemorate the holiday in South Carolina, now the first state in the Democratic Party’s reshuffled presidential primary slate.
The NAACP hosts Vice President Kamala Harris, the first Black person to hold the office, at the State House in Columbia. Harris visited the city in November to officially file the paperwork that put Biden on the presidential ballot. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, the first Black leader of a party in Congress, will speak at an interfaith prayer service. The day’s events will focus on the theme “Ballots for Freedom, Ballots for Justice, Ballots for Change!”
For many, the holidays will be an opportunity to counter recent backlash over efforts by companies and universities to implement diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.
The Rev. Al Sharpton, founder and president of the National Action Network, will announce a national campaign to support DEI measures on Monday. This comes after he led a demonstration last week against the resignation of Claudine Gay, the first black president of Harvard University. Sharpton will also host the annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day Breakfast. Members of King’s family will be in attendance.
Giving back is also an intrinsic part of the MLK holiday. AmeriCorps hosts its annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day of National Service. The government agency partners with the King Center and several charities, faith-based organizations and businesses on community service projects. Several cities and organizations are hosting their own volunteer events, such as community cleanups, food drives and packing care packages for the unhoused.
During the actual holiday, events will extend beyond Washington and King’s hometown of Atlanta. Some will discuss the war in Gaza.
Detroit is holding its 21st annual MLK Day Rally & March. The list of speakers includes Democratic Rep. Rashida Tlaib, the only Palestinian American in Congress, who was convicted for rhetoric about the war between Israel and Hamas, and Shawn Fain, the president of United Auto Workers who led negotiations for six weeks of strikes.
Even after the holidays, there are plenty of opportunities to attend events. The WK Kellogg Foundation will hold its eighth annual National Day of Racial Healing on Tuesday. It partners with nonprofits, schools and communities to host more than 200 events nationwide. These include “sing-ins” of civil rights era songs and neighborhood dialogues.
The hope is “to challenge the attitudes and assumptions people have about people different from themselves,” says Alandra Washington, the foundation’s vice president for transformation and organizational effectiveness.
“Even a conversation can make a difference in the lives of others,” she said.
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Associated Press writer Sudhin Thanawala in Atlanta contributed to this report.
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Noreen Nasir and Terry Tang are members of AP’s Race and Ethnicity team. Follow Nasir on X (formerly Twitter) at @noreensnasir. Follow Tang at @ttangAP.