A Memorial Day Challenge for Pro-Palestinian Protesters
Critics say student activists don’t understand history. The holiday offers protesters a chance to dispute that claim by honoring American traditions.
David Loesch, a 101st Airborne Veteran of the Vietnam War, searches for the names of soldiers from his unit on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial during Memorial Day last year.
Photographer: Samuel Corum/Getty Images North AmericaHillary Clinton’s recent criticism of young pro-Palestinian protesters — that they “don’t know very much about the history of the Middle East, or frankly about history in many areas of the world, including our own country” — drew angry rebukes from the left. For student activists who wish to prove her wrong, I’d like to offer a modest proposal.
This Monday, the US will mark Memorial Day, which, as some students surely know, grew out of the Civil War and was originally called Decoration Day, after the practice of decorating the graves of fallen soldiers. Even as the holiday took on different meanings in the North and South (where it became an occasion to propagate the Lost Cause), the regions shared a common practice: northerners tended to Confederate graves and southerners tended to Union graves.