Every Day Is Special: February 15 – Anniversary of the Largest Protest Event Ever

February 15 – Anniversary of the Largest Protest Event Ever

Posted on February 15, 2017

Rome

On this date in 2003, three MILLION people in Rome, Italy, protested the upcoming Iraq War. The Guinness Book of World Records lists this as the
largest anti-war rally anywhere, ever in history.

But the Roman rally was just one rally that took place on this date in 2003. On the same day, there were 1.5 million protestors in Madrid, Spain, and maybe a million in London, United Kingdom. And there were thousands, tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands of protestors in New York City and Los Angeles, and in other big cities everywhere -- from Europe to North America, from Asia to Africa to Australia.

Amsterdam

San Francisco

Tel Aviv, Israel

All in all, estimates range from 6 to 11 million participants in the February 15 protests. Like the single rally in Rome, the February 15 anti-war protests in more than 600 cities have set the record as the largest protest event ever in human history!

(In case you are wondering, the January 2017 "Women's March" on every continent and almost every country in the world - protesting Donald Trump and / or promoting women's rights, reproductive rights, minority and immigration rights - probably involved around 4.5 to 5.6 protestors worldwide -- certainly one of the largest ever, but not as large as the 2003 protest of the Iraq War.)

London

Remember, this protest was about a war that had not yet started. Officials in the United States, including then-President George W. Bush, had been speaking about and discussing the possibility of starting a war with Saddam Hussein's government mostly over fears that Hussein had violated U.N. resolutions and had developed weapons of mass destruction.

Other protests occurred in the lead-up to the war, starting in January of 2003, with about 36 million participants spread out over several months' worth of rallies and marches. The actual war began in late March, 2003.

You might already know that Iraqi weapons of mass destruction were never found.

Also on this date: