On Feb. 13, artists Diana Fakhoury and Brady Black unveiled an eight-panel art installation in front of the Washington State Capitol in Olympia. The installation honors Ayşenur Eygi, a Turkish-American activist killed by Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) in the West Bank in 2024, and Rachel Corrie, who was killed by the IOF in Gaza in 2003. Both Eygi and Corrie were targeted while volunteering with the International Solidarity Movement, a Palestinian-led organization “committed to resisting the long-entrenched and systematic oppression and dispossession of the Palestinian population, using non-violent, direct-action methods and principles.”
The installation was part of the Palestinian-led Washington for Peace and Justice’s Advocacy Day. The group gathered to urge state representatives to pressure the U.S. government to conduct an independent investigation into Eygi’s killing. This call to action follows months of advocacy from Eygi’s family, community, and other members of the movement for Palestine, who are demanding accountability for her murder.
On the morning of Sept. 6, 2024, the IOF shot and killed Ayensur Ezgi Eygi, a 26-year-old Turkish-American activist, during a protest in Beita, south of Nablus. Witnesses told Al-Jazeera that Ezgi Eygi was visible to the IOF when she was deliberately shot in the head with live ammunition.
ISM volunteers were present at the weekly scheduled demonstration in Beita, a village in the Occupied West Bank that has been facing severe threats of forced displacement and settler expansion over the past few years.
Beita has become a hub of popular resistance, with Palestinian organizers consistently holding demonstrations and protests against Zionist expansion into the village. The region is rich with olive groves, which the IOF and settlers have continuously blocked off from Palestinians.
Since 2020, 17 Palestinian protesters have been killed in Beita.
At the time of Eygi’s murder, she was among demonstrators within the olive groves, defending the land from Israeli violence and illegal confiscation. Eygi’s family released a statement immediately after her killing, reaffirming her dedication to the Palestinian cause, stating, “she was active on campus in student-led protests, advocating for human dignity, and calling for an end to the violence against the people of Palestine.”
On Sept. 9, 2024 Palestinians honored Eygi with a military funeral procession. Mourners carried her body on their shoulders, wrapped in the Palestinian flag and a keffiyeh.
Eygi’s family has been fighting for accountability for months. A few days after her killing, former U.S. President Joe Biden issued a statement describing her killing as a “tragic error,” basing his comments on an Israeli investigation.
Shortly after Eygi’s killing, the IOF conducted an investigation and claimed that she was “hit indirectly and unintentionally.” ISM swiftly responded to these claims, firmly rejecting the findings and continuing to call for an independent investigation. They stated, “The world sees through this transparent attempt to conceal the Israeli army’s responsibility for the death of Aysenur Eygi, who is just one of the hundreds of thousands of martyrs Israel has killed over decades of ethnic cleansing, displacement, and genocide.” ISM also cited eyewitness testimonies that debunked the IOF’s report.
In December of 2024, Eygi’s family met with then-Secretary of State Antony Blinken to advance their call for an independent U.S. investigation into her killing. Eygi’s sister, Ozden Bennet, told Democracy Now, that Blinken “kept deferring to the Israeli investigation,” and the family left with low expectations. Days later, three Congressional representatives from Washington state – Pramila Jayapal, Adam Smith, and Patty Murray – called on Biden to urgently launch an investigation. No U.S. investigation has taken place to date.
Eygi is not the first American citizen or ISM volunteer to be murdered by the IOF. Several American citizens have been killed by Israel over the years.
Eygi’s killing comes decades after Rachel Corrie was crushed to death by an IOF-operated bulldozer near Rafah, Gaza. the U.S. has still not taken action to bring justice to her family.
Having gone through a similar loss, Cindy and Craig Corrie, Rachel Corrie’s parents, expressed their support and condolences to Eygi’s family, “Our country and the international community must ensure that the Government of Israel is held accountable for Aysenur’s killing. In the cases of other Americans killed by the Israeli military, including in our daughter Rachel’s case, the U.S. Government has been unable, or unwilling, to hold those responsible to account. We need to do better this time.”
In an interview with Democracy Now!, Cindy Corrie recalled her experience seeking justice for her daughter. She explained how the Israeli courts and military investigations are conducted to “exonerate themselves.”
