(WHTM)– The local Palestinian community came together Friday afternoon to draw attention to the suffering of millions of civilians in Gaza and to the root causes of the long-running conflict involving Israel and Palestine.

Members of the community have been here for over an hour chanting “Free Palestine” and “Palestine will never die,” and, to be clear, upfront people at this event tell me they explicitly condemn Hamas’ attacks on Israel saying that perpetuates a cycle of violence they want to end.

At the same time, members of the community say their voices are not being heard and say the plight of Palestinians is being ignored by politicians and the media.

They say they’re advocating for millions of Gazans without access to food, water and electricity community members want humanitarian aid allowed in.

They also want what they call an Israeli occupation to end and say they want the Western world to stop funding Israeli’s attacks on the Gaza Strip.

“Any death of an innocent civilian person is wrong, and we condemn,” Palestinian-American Omar Mussa said. “We are here today as you can all see, standing up with 2.2 million people in the Gaza Strip that are under Israeli occupation, living in an open-air prison that are fighting for their lives, running for their lives.”

Organizers also say this isn’t just about what’s happening in Gaza now they say Palestinians on the West Bank are also suffering because of actions taken by the Israeli government and have been for decades.