Councilman Wallach says SJP Members “turned their back on every value that is necessary to be part of a community”

In a Boulder City Council meeting on June 4, councilmember Mark Wallach gave a statement condemning Boulder Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), following the release of their statement calling for the release of political prisoner Mohamed Sabry Soliman.

In SJP’s statement, the group calls for the release of Soliman, who has been arrested and given a life sentence and 2178 years in prison for his firebombing of zionists on Boulder’s Pearl Street. The zionists, led by Rachel Amaru’s organization, Run for Their Lives, were marching for the return of settler hostages held by Hamas.

“[SJP members] have turned their back on every value that is necessary to be part of a community,” said Wallach during his two-minute statement. Wallach criticized the students, saying they have lost all touch with their humanity. He said they should be reviled and pitied during his statement.

Wallach, an unwavering zionist, has also consistently voted against calls to divest from Microsoft and Caterpillar, whose investments in Boulder are over $6 million and $10 million, respectively. Microsoft provides the IOF with Azure cloud and AI services used to target Palestinians. Caterpillar provides bulldozers that zionists use to demolish Palestinian houses.

Wallach also believes that this statement means American society has “reached a new low.” Despite American society having been founded on the genocide of almost 90% of all Indigenous peoples, Wallach sees the release of a statement endorsing a political prisoner as the worst atrocity.

Wallach brings to attention that the woman killed by Soliman was a Holocaust survivor, but does not acknowledge the current holocaust in Gaza that caused Soliman to act as he did. The councilmember’s only mention of Palestine is when he says SJP’s name, because Soliman’s attack has been branded antisemitic and not a reaction to a holocaust of his own people.

“This is one of the worst acts I have encountered during my tenure on this body,” said Wallach as he closed his statement. Zionists killed at least 11 Palestinians on June 4 in Gaza.

Wallach’s full statement can be read below:

“A student group at the University of Colorado, who call themselves ‘Boulder Students for Justice in Palestine,’ have just published a letter attempting to justify the cold-blooded murder of Karen Diamond and the injuring of more than a dozen other local citizens on June 1st of last year, by a cold-blooded act of terror. This act of terrorism by Mohamed Soliman, who is now justly serving a sentence of life imprisonment plus 2178 years, is now characterized as an act of “freedom-fighting heroism.” Allow me a moment to briefly respond. In an era where standards of decency and compassion seem to be declining by the day, we have now reached a new low. One that any decent human being would regard as simply despicable. It is beyond understanding how any individual could have reached adulthood with so little compassion and so little empathy, as to celebrate the murner, murder, by burning alive of a woman who was a survivor of the Holocaust. Is it any wonder that when contacted by the Daily Camera, not one of these brave individuals would go on the record, hiding behind the anonymity of their group? To celebrate the murder and injury of peaceful protestors, whose only issue was their desire to see hostages return to their families, is the attitude of individuals who have lost all touch with their humanity. They are to be reviled, of course, but they are also to be pitied, as individuals who have turned their back on every value that is necessary to be part of a community. This is one of the worst acts I have encountered during my tenure on this body. If I am un, if I am fortunate, and I doubt I will be, I will not see its like again. I hope the members of this council will join me in the condemnation of this behavior. Thank you.”