Hundreds of students walk out of Stanford commencement over war in Gaza

More than three hundred Stanford University students walked out of the school’s commencement ceremony on Sunday morning as outgoing President Richard Saller delivered his final address to over 5,400 graduates.

“Embrace your future with gratitude and optimism while acknowledging the suffering of others,” Saller said as students cheered and raised Palestinian flags on the way out of the gates of Stanford Stadium.

Students for Palestine, a pro-Palestinian student group, said they walked out “in protest of the university’s inaction regarding student demands for divestment.”

The walkout follows a similar action at UC Berkeley’s graduation ceremony last month. And it caps months of protests at Stanford, where students have set up multiple protest encampments and just days ago barricaded themselves inside the president’s office in a demonstration that left some of the school’s historic sandstone structure damaged. More than a dozen people were arrested following the incident and Stanford said it would suspend students involved and prohibit those who were seniors from graduating.

Stanford president Richard Saller glances to his left during his speech and watches as graduates stand up and walk out during the 133rd commencement ceremony at Stanford University in Stanford, Calif., on Sunday, June 16, 2024. About halfway through the event hundreds of students stood up and walked out in support of Palestinians affected by the Israel-Hamas war. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)

“Over the past nine months, students at Stanford had been continuously protesting, demanding that the university divest from companies… involved in the ongoing violence and genocide in the Gaza Strip,” the group said in a statement.

While Saller, who paused briefly as the walkout began but remained composed, continued speaking, a crowd of students trekked over to a corner of Ueland Field on campus to hold their own ceremony where students and faculty members delivered speeches criticizing the university for punitive measures against student activists and for ignoring demands that the university divest from Israel.

Some families also joined students at the alternative ceremony, dubbed “The People’s Commencement.”

A pro-Palestine student who joined the walkout and identified as “Kunal,” said that while starting college during the pandemic and ending it during a period of civil unrest is disappointing, “nothing compares to what’s going on in Gaza.”

“If we keep shaking (institutions), it will eventually stop the injustice,” he said.

Security was tighter than usual during this year’s commencement, but none of the security officers intervened or attempted to stop the alternate gathering.

As Stanford president Richard Saller was giving his speech, graduates stood up and walked out during the 133rd commencement ceremony at Stanford University in Stanford, Calif., on Sunday, June 16, 2024. About halfway through the event hundreds of students stood up and walked out in support of Palestinians affected by the Israel-Hamas war. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)

At the main commencement ceremony, only those issued tickets were allowed to enter, while everyone was subject to a bag search and had to walk through metal detectors.

According to Stanford officials, about 29,000 tickets were requested for family and friends of the class of 2024.

Melinda Gates, the philanthropist, businesswoman and ex-wife of Microsoft founder Bill Gates, was this year’s commencement speaker. And while she didn’t mention the protests explicitly, she acknowledged the current unrest.

“You are graduating into a broken world, but it is community that rebuilds things,” Gates told the graduates. “Together is how you’ll make the broken things whole again.”

The co-founder of the Gates Foundation, who recently announced she was leaving the major nonprofit, encouraged graduates to build community with those around them, urging attendees to be willing to shift their thinking and step into the future with “radical open-heartedness.”

“You will encounter possibilities you haven’t even imagined,” she said.

Melinda French Gates delivers the commencement address during the 133rd commencement ceremony at Stanford University in Stanford, Calif., on Sunday, June 16, 2024. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)

Even amid the walkout, many graduating students — donning black and red regalia — appeared to be in festive mood, smiling and cheering under a clear blue sky as their degrees were conferred.

The university is among major educational institutions across the nation that have been grappling with intense protests by student movements demanding their institutions condemn Israel’s military strikes in Gaza and divest from business interests linked to the war.

Long before the Columbia University encampment captured the nation’s attention and sparked student activists to set up similar pro-Palestine encampments across the country, Stanford students held a 120-day sit in shortly after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack in Israel triggered intense military strikes in Gaza.

According to the latest figures by the Gaza Health Ministry, over 37,000 Palestinians — both civilians and combatants — have been killed in the war.

Sofia Portillo, who participated in the walkout, said that while the cause the students are fighting for — to end the war in Gaza — is tragic, it also brought something positive to the student community.

“Coming off of the pandemic, it was really hard to get people to come together and organize,” said Portillo, who graduated with a bachelor’s degree in psychology and a master’s in community health. “People were just so used to being in their homes. But now we are starting to actually take action in ways we haven’t seen in the past five years.”