Hundreds gathered two years after the attack to share stories of loss and resilience.
On Oct. 5, over 200 members of the Kingston community came together for a vigil remembering the Hamas-led attack on Israel that occurred on Oct. 7, 2023. The pre-registered memorial begun at 6:15 p.m. in Grant Hall and was hosted by Hillel, Chabad, StandWithUs Canada, Run for their Lives Kingston, and Beth Israel Kingston. The evening featured a video presentation by StandWithUs and speeches from Queen’s students and other community representatives.
Among the speakers was Mika Heler, Nurs ’26, vice-president of Israel at Hillel, a Jewish student life organization. In an interview with The Journal, she discussed her personal connection to the attacks.
“On Oct. 7, one of my family members was kidnapped,” she said. “His name is Alexander Lobanov. He ended up being murdered in Aug. 2024, and his body was brought back on Sept. 1, 2024.”
Heler said other Queen’s students also lost close relatives and friends in the Oct. 7 attacks. She emphasized the importance of providing a safe space on campus for students and the wider community to mourn those lives.
“Sometimes we get so caught up in school that we forget to take a second for ourselves as well,” she said. “It’s important to really give students those spaces to speak about what happened to them and their family, to give students a community.”
It was during the first on-campus vigil for Oct. 7, which took place shortly after the initial attacks in 2023, that Heler witnessed a community band together in response to the attacks.
“We saw so many people come together for this one event to support each other […] and it wasn’t just Jewish students, it was students from all over, from different faculties. We’ve even had people who aren’t part of the Queen’s community coming to support us,” she said.
Heler expressed a desire to end the vigil on a note of resilience despite the Israeli-Palestinian conflict still ongoing and a reported 48 hostages still being held in Gaza.
“We’re living our lives for those that we’ve lost,” she said. “So, we want to end on that resilience note. We can continue to live for them, be here for them, and be here for ourselves as well.”
Preceding the vigil was a walk with Run for their Lives—a global organization attempting to raise awareness of the hostages still in Gaza.
“[Run for their Lives] message is that we’re going to run for their lives because they currently can’t,” Heler said. “So, typically they do run each week on Sundays, it’s a way for us every week to say we’re remembering you. We’re still running for you.”
The vigil offered a similar opportunity for reflection, giving the Queen’s community a moment to honour the victims and show solidarity.
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Rosemary Euringer
I was devastated by the attack in Australia. I’m not Jewish, but would like to show solidarity. Is there a Hanukkah candlelight vigil, or some other stand against violence?