By Zeena Ojjeh

More than a 1,000 people walked from the Student Center to the Ceremonial Court inside Education City carrying placards with the names of the victims, Deah Barakat, Yusor Abu-Salha, and Razan Abu-Salha, written on them. Leading the walk were Shaikha Hind, the sister of Qatar’s ruler and the American Ambassador Dana Smith.

Karine Walther, an American history professor in Georgetown University in Qatar, has written a book on Islamophobia in the United States, said “to call what happened anything other then a hate crime is to not understand the historical and political circumstances that have led to this.”

When people ended the walk at the Ceremonial Court, Deah’s brother and sister, Suzanne Barakat and Farris Barakat, were shown on an outdoor screen speaking to the walkers.

Their message to people was that, “love overcomes all and that our brother died because of hate and ignorance.” They also emphasized that the Chapel Hill police had been helpful. People were asked to “not insult our family by engaging in any act of violence because that would undermine and pollute the image of the victims and Islam.”

After the video, students from Qatar Foundation gave speeches, both in Arabic and English.

Hessa Al- Thani, a student in Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar said, “The shooting was horrible, very sad and scary. It is scary that this happened to people because they were Muslim.”

Aya Gaballa, another student at CMU, echoed this sentiment, stating; “What happened was an act of terrorism. It wasn’t anything else.”

Father Thomas, an American citizen said, “I came because three people who didn’t do anything were killed in my country. I think that many people have prejudices because of nationality, religion or gender. We don’t admit this to ourselves but the slightest thing annoys us. Who kills over a parking space? Murder is murder. Hate crime is a side issue and it shouldn’t detract from the real issue.” Thomas is a professor at Georgetown University in Qatar.

Gerd Nonneman, the dean of Georgetown said that what happened was largely due to “prejudice combined with loose gun laws.”

Not everyone who attended the walk liked the way it was organized.

“It felt like a QF public relations piece. They were only speaking in Arabic, more than half of the people couldn’t speak Arabic they weren’t concerned with their audience or people who came to mourn the victims,” said Farida Zahran, a student at Northwestern.

“A lot of it was people talking about their students here, and how they are students here and they feel safe. It steered away from the main point. It didn’t come from the students, it came from QF.” Zahran said that the walk should have focused on what was said in the video by the Barakats.

The walk concluded with a video of Deah, before his death, urging people to donate money to the Syrian Dental Care Relief. Boxes for donations will be set up around Qatar Foundation until the end of the week.