Protests at the Democrats’ Convention Weren’t as Big and Disruptive as Some Expected

It wasn’t 1968. It wasn’t even close.

After months of anticipation, planning and vows of mass protest in Chicago that called to mind the tumult of the 1968 Democratic National Convention, the demonstrators who challenged the Democratic Party over the conflict in Gaza remained largely in the background.

While thousands of people joined enthusiastic daily protests in parks and on the streets of Chicago, a city with a deep history of protests, their numbers were fewer than organizers had hoped.

All week, demonstrators chanted and marched near the convention site, angrily calling for a cease-fire and an end to U.S. aid for Israel, but failed to seriously disrupt the convention and its celebration of Vice President Kamala Harris, the party’s presidential nominee. Though many demonstrators hoped that the convention organizers would grant a speaker of Palestinian descent a chance to address the crowd, that request was ultimately denied.

And after four days of protesters pushing to make the war in Gaza a focus of the convention, its final evening on Thursday ended with Ms. Harris directly acknowledging the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza and repeating calls for a cease-fire, but also centering her speech on discussions of abortion access, immigration and the record of her opponent.

“There is some sort of wall between what we’re saying and what these politicians are willing to hear,” Josephine Guilbeau, an Army veteran, said at a pro-Palestinian protest on Thursday, lamenting that Democratic leaders had mostly ignored the cries of protesters.

On the last night of the convention, protesters acknowledged they were tired after days of demonstrations, but hundreds marched until after 9 p.m. Organizers summed up the week on an