Content Warning: This article contains mentions of suicide.

More than a dozen protesters disrupted a Wednesday night Q Center event featuring a transgender activist who served in the Israel Defense Forces.

Michael Alroy addressed students over Zoom and shared stories about his experience as a transgender man in Israel at the event, which was held in collaboration with Hillel at Binghamton.

“I’ll tell you one thing and this is what my story is about: It’s not just being part of the LGBTQ community and being trans,” Alroy said. “It’s about being and building resilience. So imagine how much crap we all have to go through in life. We all have our own stories, and the whole idea of it is, this is what I want to tell you all: that you come out stronger on the other hand.”

The first protesters arrived at the Q Center a little after 7 p.m., when the event was scheduled to begin, and more entered the room after it had started. Most silently held signs for the duration of Alroy’s hourlong talk, and when the floor was opened for a Q&A, protesters began asking questions and shouting different phrases, like “free, free Palestine” and “no pride in genocide.”

Though an Instagram post promoting the event mentioned Alroy’s background in the IDF, he said during the talk that he did not intend for the event to be political. He largely focused on his experiences as a trans person, growing up first in South Africa and then in Israel, struggling with his mental health as a teenager, and eventually transitioning socially and medically before going to college.

He said that from a young age, he struggled to feel like he belonged but was unable to put the feelings into words until, when he was 15, his mother showed him a document with 15 “symptoms” of being transgender. She didn’t do this to support him, telling him instead never to “do something” about this discovery because nobody would accept him. Feeling isolated and disrespected by his family and peers, Alroy attempted suicide and was sent to a psychiatric hospital, which he described as “hell.”

“We hope attendees take away the understanding that trans and queer identities exist globally and that it is essential to engage with diverse lived experiences,” Chelsea Rego, the executive director of Hillel at Binghamton, wrote to Pipe Dream before the event. “Listening to personal stories, especially from perspectives outside the U.S., helps build greater awareness and inclusivity.”

Over the next few years, Alroy found a girlfriend who saw him for who he really was and started going to a support group, but he had not publicly transitioned. Then, as is mandatory regardless of gender in Israel, he enlisted in the IDF. Alroy briefly mentioned his time serving in the military, saying that he wasn’t in active combat, then moved on to discussing his transition in 2012.

The last portion of his talk centered on his experience coming out in college, where he chose to spread awareness of being transgender instead of hiding his identity. He showed a video, taken by an Israeli news channel, of a gathering he organized to come out to his college peers, where he received overwhelming support.

At the end of the talk, Alroy addressed protesters directly, saying he was “glad” they were in attendance but that he had encountered protesters at previous talks who were unwilling to have a dialogue with him, instead preferring to talk at him.

Protesters then asked Alroy questions about Israel’s military offensive in the Gaza Strip, but the conversation quickly devolved into a shouting match between protesters and event attendees. Officers from the University Police Department soon got involved, repeatedly asking some protesters to leave and eventually forcibly removing them, threatening arrest.

Raymond Bernstein, a junior majoring in social work, said that Alroy had “a very similar experience to what I’ve dealt with my entire life” and that he finally “found someone who understands what I have been through in a more serious way.”

“He came to talk to other trans youth to try to make them feel more comfortable and let them know that they’re not alone,” Bernstein said. “And these pro-Palestinians scared off everybody and made everyone feel uncomfortable with asking questions that they wanted to ask him.”

“And instead of this being a space where we felt comfortable and were able to open up, we felt terrified to tell our truths because these people — they scare us,” he added. “But we say it anyway because we are here for the speaker, we’re not here for those people.”

Leila Nations and her wife Rend, activists who do not attend BU, were key players in the demonstration. Rend, who cited her background as part of her motivation for protesting the talk, is a queer Palestinian.

Nations approached the camera toward the beginning of the demonstration and addressed Alroy directly.

“You are coming to people and telling people that you’re an IDF soldier, right?” Nations said. “Like, that’s something that you are. Your identity is coming forward. Your transness is coming forward.”

“You’re saying that there should be a dialogue with every single one of these people, and these people are here ready to have a dialogue with you, but you’re saying that that you’re not going to actually have that dialogue, so you’re either being a hypocrite, or you’re just avoiding to talk to people who support Palestinians, most of whom are queer and most of whom are trans,” she continued.

As Alroy attempted to respond, Rend interrupted to ask him to explain how he’s “depoliticizing” his “political identities” as a transgender Israeli person, and she and other protesters drowned out Alroy’s answer. Rend was removed by the campus police officers, and Nations followed shortly afterward. Before she left, Nations and Alroy tentatively agreed to meet at a later date over YouTube Live to discuss further.

As they were pulled out of the room, protesters shouted that the event and police response were a “stain on the Q Center’s reputation.”

Samuél, the president of The Yiddish Bund of Binghamton, also attended the event as a protester. He told Pipe Dream that he saw the Q Center’s involvement in this event as hypocritical, given what he saw as its support for a March 3 Pinkwashing educational presentation organized by the Rainbow Pride Union and Students for Justice in Palestine.

“So it’s like this country or this occupation that puts on like a facade of progressivism, but then goes and indiscriminately bombs Palestinians, which includes queer and trans Palestinians, including a lot of children,” he said. “So we were sure to point out the hypocrisy in the Q Center in having an IOF soldier here who’s gonna hide behind their trans identity to do PR, essentially for the Israeli occupation.”

Samuél called on the Q Center to issue a formal apology, identifying “how they did wrong,” and to work with “organizations that actually support human rights” in the future.

“Hillel at Binghamton remains committed to fostering open and respectful dialogue, where all students can engage with diverse perspectives in a safe and supportive environment,” Rego wrote in a statement to Pipe Dream after the event. “While we recognize that conversations on complex topics can evoke strong emotions, we encourage all expressions of viewpoint to be shared in a manner that fosters constructive dialogue and mutual respect.”

“We appreciate the efforts of campus staff and security in supporting a safe and inclusive environment for all attendees,” they continued.” Our goal remains to provide meaningful opportunities for learning and engagement, and we look forward to fostering future discussions that encourage mutual respect, open-mindedness, and a genuine exchange of perspectives.”

Mansha Rahman, a junior double-majoring in art and design and Spanish who works in the Q Center, was among the protesters. They said the turnaround for planning the event was quick and that the center’s professional and student staff did not have much say.

They said that while the Q Center did not fund the event, it sent a poor message to queer Palestinian and Muslim students, in part referring to Alroy’s social media page, which they said spread negative “rhetoric about Islam.”

“I grew up Muslim, but I still feel really strongly about the representation of those people on this campus,” Rahman, who also serves as president of the Rainbow Pride Union, said. “I don’t see enough attention or enough collabs or anything or enough effort put into doing stuff with Muslim student organizations, Muslim student associations and other multicultural organizations.”

The Q Center declined to comment before and after the event. A University spokesperson and Alroy did not return separate requests for comment.

“The purpose of last night’s event was to foster an environment of education and dialogue,” wrote Arielle Schlissel, Hillel’s president and a senior double-majoring in psychology and anthropology, and Myles Resnick, the organization’s executive vice president and senior with an individualized major in mass media studies. “We believe that learning from one another and having meaningful conversations is key to understanding each other and gaining mutual respect. However, the event was disrupted by protestors who created an environment that was extremely uncomfortable and unsafe for the Jewish students in attendance.”

“The actions of those who disrupted the event made it so that the event was almost unable to continue,” they added. “This event was meant to be a space to learn and understand the complex identity of being Jewish and Queer. We hope that moving forward we are able to have meaningful dialogue that builds a greater understanding of others. We will continue to advocate for the voices of Queer Jewish individuals to be heard and for all members of our community to feel safe on Binghamton’s campus.”

Editor’s Note (3/20): A previous version of this article misstated Resnick’s year. He is a senior. The UJA-Federation of New York has also been removed from the list of the event’s sponsors. Pipe Dream regrets the errors.