PSL Holds Another Protest for Palestine at Depot Park
The Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL) Gainesville chapter held a protest in support of Palestine at Depot Park Sunday.
Depot Park is one of the most common places in Gainesville for protests to occur. PSL has held several pro-Palestine protests at Depot Park over the past year.
A few dozen protesters arrived around noon on the roundabout between Cade Museum and the Boxcar Beer & Wine Garden. They stayed in the area for two hours, holding signs, shouting chants and listening to speeches.
A little over a year ago, the movement for divestment from Israel took hold in Alachua County. The City of Gainesville has investments in companies affiliated with Israel in their general employees pension plan.
Under Florida law, municipalities can only consider monetary factors when making financial factors.
After hearing from Palestine advocates, the Alachua County Board of Commissioners (BOC) decided to divest. The BOC divested from all corporate notes unanimously, saying treasury holdings are better for capital preservation and less risky, allowing them to divest under Florida law.
When activists asked the City of Gainesville to divest, Mayor Harvey Ward said the BOC has “an entirely different reading of the same law,” and refused to divest, with most commissioners in agreement.
Activists asked the city to divest a few more times but soon stopped going to the meetings. Since then, the majority of pro-Palestine protests have taken place at Depot Park. There have been some protests for Palestine at city hall in the past year, but not on days where commissioners were meeting.
Multiple individuals have told GnvInfo that some activists said they were “at capacity,” regarding the reason they stopped asking the city to divest.
According to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, between October 7, 2023 and October 6, 2025, 67,160 Gazans have been killed by Israeli forces, and 169,679 injured.
Today, the Palestinian Ministry of Health issued a statement amid the two-year anniversary of October 7, 2023.
“The ‘israeli’ occupation, two years into the war of genocide, continues its direct and systematic threat against health institutions and medical staff.
Over the past two years, 1,701 medical staff members have been martyred, and 362 have been arrested under conditions of detention, enforced disappearance, and deprivation of their human rights.
Medical staff in hospitals continue to fulfill their humanitarian and national duty despite the surrounding dangers that pose a direct threat to their safety.
The Ministry of Health renews its urgent appeal to provide full protection for medical staff and for the tasks of evacuating and transporting the wounded and injured.”
