Gathered at the gazebo by Lake Ontario Park, surrounded by images of Israeli hostages still in Gaza, participants took part in a weekly run or walk in their honour.
Over 40 students and community members gathered at 9:30 a.m. on Sept. 15 for their weekly walk through Kingston, inspired by the Run for Their Lives movement, to call for the immediate release of Israeli hostages currently held in Gaza. The most recent walk highlighted the birthdays of hostages still in captivity in Gaza, Gali and Ziv Berman, and Yosef-Haim Ohana, by lighting candles in their honour.
Run for Their Lives promotes their upcoming walks with graphics featuring the message, “We will walk… until they come home,” encouraging people to join their 18-minute “Chai” Walk. In Judaism, “Chai” symbolizes life, and its letters have a numerical value of 18—the same number of minutes the one km venture typically takes.
The walk took place 345 days since the Oct. 7 attack when 240 Israeli hostages were taken by Hamas.
READ MORE: Exploring the Jewish Diaspora: Reflections after October 7
Run for Their Lives, launched by a group of Israelis in California’s Bay Area in partnership with the Hostage and Missing Families Forum, inspired Kingston residents Melissa Greenberg, Hilary Tenenhouse, Sarah Delaney, and Jacqui Collier to organize a weekly walk in Kingston. The first walk took place on Feb. 25, joining a global movement that includes 226 other groups in cities worldwide.
In an interview with The Journal, Greenberg highlighted these walks are not protests—they call for the release of Israeli hostages currently held by Hamas in Gaza, who come from several faiths and countries.
“There’s this global movement to free the hostages and it’s actually very heartwarming,” Greenberg said.
Greenberg explained while the group united to support the hostages and their families, event participants have also become a supportive community for one another.
“We come to be together because we’re heartbroken and we lift each other up. We actually do raise each other’s spirits by coming together,” she said.
Those participating in the walk wore red to symbolize the bleeding hearts of the hostages and their families. The logo on the shirts that some participants wore shows a baby’s footprints to remind people that Hamas didn’t make a distinction between young and old when they kidnapped both elderly Holocaust survivors and babies, Greenberg explained.
“It’s not a protest. It’s not a march. It’s not a rally. It’s a walk. We don’t have megaphones, and we aren’t political,” she added.
Greenberg has worked with several organization for different walks including Hillel Queen’s, an organization that advocates for Jewish students, and the Chabad Student Centre of Kingston, a welcoming space for Jewish students and community members to connect, offering weekly Shabbat dinners and hosting students for High Holidays. These organizations, combined with Greenberg’s efforts, help foster turnouts of up to 200 people for past weekly walks.
While this past week’s walk started at Lake Ontario, they usually begin in symbolic places such as Kingston Penitentiary to represent the captivity of hostages or alleys to symbolize the tunnels in Gaza.
“The reality is that if they were hostages taken from anywhere else, everybody would be in the streets [protesting],” said Greenberg. “This is a global issue and tragedy, so why aren’t people walking with us?”
Greenberg encourages students and community members to join the group in their weekly walks.
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