Several hundred students and their supporters protested the Iraq War after its fifth anniversary last week, with many taking part in an organized “walkout” from class and marching through the streets of New Brunswick.

Sumia Ibrahim estimated about 700 people participated in the March 27 protest. Various estimates ranged from 200 to more than 1,000.

Watch MTV coverage of the March 27 walkout at Rutgers (3:42)

Ibrahim is a Rutgers senior and one of the organizers of the Rutgers Walkout Coalition, an alliance of 11 student groups at Rutgers.

“It was really amazing to see that kind of unity,” Ibrahim said. “Throughout my four years at Rutgers, I have never seen that around any event or issue.” Ibrahim said that each organization made an active contribution since planning for the walkout started after winter break, and that the groups will remain banded together to work towards the goal of ending the Iraq War.

The protest began with a rally on Voorhees Mall, where a memorial for Vietnam veterans is located. For about an hour and a half, speakers motivated the growing crowd with speeches and chants. They included New Jersey resident Sue Niederer, an outspoken war critic and member of Gold Star Families for Peace. Her son, Rutgers alumnus Seth Dvorin, was killed in Iraq in February 2004. A few dozen counterprotestors expressed their opposition to the walkout.

Speakers also included a number of members of Iraq Veterans Against the War, several spoken word artists, and a number of Rutgers faculty including Larry Romsted, professor of chemistry and chemical biology at the School of Arts and Sciences.

Romsted, who is involved with the Central Jersey Coalition Against Endless War, read a quote from Nazi official Hermann Goering issued while his war crimes trial took place in Nuremberg: “All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.”

“Since he was the No. 2 Nazi in Germany at the time, that’s quite a statement,” Romsted said.

Although Romsted did not have class that Wednesday, he said that if he had, he would have considered canceling it, as several Rutgers faculty did, so that students could attend the walkout. Dozens of faculty members signed a petition supporting the walkout.

“I have a fundamental responsibility to teach. At the same time, this war is atrocious,” Romsted said. “I consider [the walkout] to be … an important political event.”

Rally attendees marched from College Avenue Campus to Voorhees Chapel on the Douglass Campus. On the way, they sat in silence at the busy intersection of George and Albany streets for five minutes, each minute representative of years the United States has spent in Iraq.

They gathered at the Heldrich Center in downtown New Brunswick, just blocks away from Democratic U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone’s office, to place pressure on the congressman not to vote for continued war funding.

Ibrahim said the Rutgers Walkout Coalition will continue pursuing antiwar efforts. “We plan to keep doing what we’ve been doing, but hopefully with a greater number of students doing it,” Ibrahim said.