Israel-Hamas War’s Dead Remembered On Elm St.

Ben Ori, 31.
Aisha Khalil Hamdan, 72.
Wahba Abdullah Hussein, 65.
Ibrahim Hamid Hussein, 62.
Muhammad Suleiman Turki, 61.
Nadia Yassin Hussein, 60.
Salwa Muhammad Khalil, 60.

Allie Perry and Melinda Tuhus read those names of the dead — and many, many, many more — on Thursday at noon on the sidewalk outside of 59 Elm St.

Perry, Tuhus, and two dozen fellow peace activists gathered on the downtown block outside of the entrance to U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro’s office to read the names of the thousands upon thousands of victims of the escalating Israel-Hamas war in the Middle East.

They read the names and ages of some of the 1,400 Israelis killed during the Oct. 7 cross-border terrorist attack by Hamas. They read the names and ages of some of the 8,000-plus Palestinians killed in the ensuing weeks of Israeli military response in Gaza targeted at Hamas.

Dor Avitan, 26.
Hanaa Ibrahim Naeem, 59.
Suleiman Muhammad Suleiman, 58.
Yousry Ahmed Youssef, 55.
Shafiqa Shehada Bahr, 54.
Anwar Muhammad Ali, 54.
Waela Ahmed Mustafa, 51.

They also read in a six-to-one ratio — with one reader saying aloud one name of the Israeli dead, and another reader saying aloud six names of the Palestinian dead — to reflect the current death toll in the escalating conflict. After each reading of seven names, Stephen Kobasa tapped the handle of a screwdriver against the base of a Tibetan singing bowl, letting out a soft plaintive peaceful ding.

“Every number is a person,” said Perry, a minister with the Shalom United Church of Christ. ​“Every person is a human being fully beloved, a child of God, unique, precious, irreplaceable.”

The names of the dead came from lists published by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz and the news blog Mondoweiss.

The reading of the names of the dead marked just the latest effort by New Haveners and Yalies to publicly reckon with and grieve the escalating violence in the Middle East.

Sigal Itah, 27.
Wael Ahmed Mustafa, 49.
Marwa Youssef Muhammad, 48.
Abdullah Musa Muhammad, 48.
Raafat Abdel Karim Mustafa, 47.
Wejdan Ahmed Mustaf, 46.
Ramzi Abdel Karim Mustafa, 45.

Over the course of the first half hour, the group made it through roughly 50 names, with Kobasa’s bell ringing out over Elm Street after each grouping of seven.

Eden Naftali, 23.
Ramzi Abdel Karim Mustafa, 44.
Muhammad Kamal Muhammad, 44.
Nedaa Abdel Hamid Saeed, 43.
Ola Tawfiq Abdel Qade, 41.
Sodfa Suleiman Othman, 39.
Hussein Ahmed Oma, 38.