Thousands of Israel supporters gathered Tuesday on the National Mall for the largest pro-Israel rally in decades, determined to show unity as the conflict with Hamas continues.

“We haven’t felt this kind of existential threat to Israel in a long time,” said Joel Schwitzer, the Dallas-area director of the American Jewish Committee, one of the hundreds of North Texans who traveled to Washington for the March for Israel. “This is different from anything I’ve ever experienced.”

Security was high, with police everywhere and streets around the National Mall shut down. Buses from synagogues all over the Northeast came to the capital, as well as groups from Texas and farther away by plane. National Jewish groups organized the rally last week to fight back against growing hostility to Israel, and antisemitism that has increased since the war began.

The rally was set to start at noon Dallas time, while Congress was in session.

That was not a coincidence.

Congress has not acted on President Joe Biden’s request for $14 billion in security aid for Israel, which has been stalled by opposition to other requests for $9 billion in humanitarian aid for Gaza and $61 billion for Ukraine.

The new House speaker, Mike Johnson, R-La., was expected to speak to the crowd. So were the top Democrats in Congress: House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, both from New York.”

Family members of some of the 240 hostages still trapped in Gaza will also speak, along with Natan Sharansky, a former Soviet prisoner who spent years fighting to leave.

A 1987 march to protest Soviet repression of Jews attracted 250,000 people. In 2002, during a Palestinian uprising, 100,000 Israel supporters rallied at the Capitol.

The current crisis has brought rare harmony between secular and religious Jews, and even between groups that agree and disagree with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s policies of expanding into the West Bank.

“I’m not a religious person,” said Dallas resident Arona Ackermann, 53, whose grandparents escaped Lithuania in 1933 for what became Israel in 1948. She feels a “strong duty” to honor the sacrifices “of all of my ancestors” and those defending Israel now, given the current danger.”

The war started with a series of raids Oct. 7 that killed 1,200 people, carried out by Hamas, which the United States and European Union consider terrorists. The group, backed by Iran, wants to drive all Jews out of Israel, and has ruled Gaza since 2006.

Israel said about 70% of the dead were unarmed civilians, including children and elderly.

Some bodies were burned and mutilated.

“We should not forget the brutal attacks of October 7,” said Schwitzer. “No country would tolerate that without responding.”

Israel’s response has been harsh. After weeks of bombing and a ground operation that is still going on, the Gaza Health Ministry, run by Hamas, has reported more than 11,100 deaths. Most are women and children.

That’s one out of every 200 people in Gaza.

As media outlets have shown, that was part of the Hamas strategy — to trigger a heavy response that would turn the world against Israel.

The attack was also meant to stop a growing improvement in Arab-Israeli relations, which Hamas feared would weaken the pressure over the Palestinian issue. Iran was especially worried by a possible deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia, its main regional rival.

Israeli tanks reached the entrance of Al Shifa Hospital, the biggest in Gaza, on Monday.

Israel says Hamas uses tunnels under the hospital as a base. American officials agree with that but also share the growing international worries about the hundreds of patients and medical staff who have not left, despite Israel’s warning to do so.

Gaza health officials say 32 patients have died since Saturday, including newborns whose incubators stopped working because of no power.

“We can all grieve for that destruction even as we understand that Hamas has forced Israel to act,” said Schwitzer.

A Nov. 4 pro-Palestinian march in Washington attracted tens of thousands of protesters.

A huge march in London last weekend drew 300,000 people, according to police.

Pro-Palestinian protesters have called for a ceasefire. Israel rejects that, saying that would let Hamas rebuild.

The March for Israel was led by the Jewish Federations of North America and the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations.

Showing the importance, all five clergy members at Dallas’ conservative Congregation Shearith Israel planned to attend, along with dozens of members.

Ackermann has followed the developments closely.

Her brother lives in Israel. Her husband, a lawyer, is going there later this month to spend two weeks as a volunteer, doing tasks that free up soldiers for more important work.

Their son is in Jerusalem on a gap semester before college. Since the war started, he’s had a weekly ticket to fly home, just in case.

“If Israel can’t be home for Jewish people, and all people to live in peace, then where can he go?” she said.”