In a rare act of moral defiance, a group of Jewish activists in Chicago have launched an open-ended hunger strike to protest the ongoing Israeli massacres in Gaza and the role of the United States in fuelling the war. Organised by Jewish Voice for Peace, the strike is being led by academics and community leaders demanding an immediate end to U.S. military funding to Israel and the lifting of the blockade that has left Gaza’s population on the brink of famine.

The protest aligns with a mass rally held in downtown Chicago, where demonstrators called for urgent humanitarian relief and an end to arms shipments to Israel. Among those in attendance was Congresswoman Delia Ramirez, a vocal advocate of the “Stop Arming Israel Act,” which seeks to cut military exports to Tel Aviv.

For Palestinians, this rare show of solidarity from within the American Jewish community offers a glimmer of hope in a landscape dominated by silence and complicity. The hunger strikers say their stance is not only political, but a deeply moral one.