It started with a war.
Then came the newspaper headlines and the personal opinions argued via poster paint and plastic signs on the side of the road as people took international politics into their homes.
Hebah Ahmed, a member of the Coalition to Stop $30 Billion to Israel, said political misinformation is now running amok in the U.S.
Ahmed said her group is against using American tax dollars to fund the Israeli military.
The group raised enough money to purchase a two-month contract for 10 billboards from Lamar Outdoor Advertising only to be informed that its money wasn't enough to keep the message up, she said.
Ahmed said that Lamar Outdoor Advertising caved under mounting pressure from the pro-Israeli public and decided to take the signs down Tuesday.
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"In their contract, they reserve the right to pull anything down," Ahmed said.
Ahmed said the group put up 10 billboards around the city that read "Tell Congress, stop killing children. No more military aid to Israel."
The billboards had been up for three weeks, she said.
"We expected this," Ahmed said. "Most people don't realize there's a very strong anti-Palestine bias and the pro-Israeli lobby, and I think what's very interesting is to note how much our economy is suffering and how many programs in this country are not getting funded, yet we have committed to a 10-year commitment of $3 billion dollars a year to the state of Israel. Compare it to our economy in the United States and how we're not even taking care of our own, yet we're busy shipping money overseas."
Mae Eye, vice president of Israel Alliance, said that not every pro-Israeli supporter is anti-Palestinian. However, the public has been misinformed on the facts of the situation, Eye said.
"People have one view of what the Palestinians are up to and another of what the Israelis are up to," she said. "Now, they both deserve a country and they both deserve their own space, and Israel is willing to do that, but the Palestinians are . not even willing to admit to an Israeli state. They won't recognize Israel as a state, but they want the Israelis to recognize them as a state. You see, it's one-sided there. If people just did more reading, they would get a better picture."
Eye said people should read the Hamas charter if they want to get a better idea of how lopsided the political situation is in the Middle East.
Eye said she plans to hand out copies of the charter at today's Israel Independence Day event in the SUB Santa Ana Room.
"I like to talk about the charter and hand it out to people because they say explicitly in there that their goal is to destroy Israel," Eye said. "They don't want it to exist at all, and it's very explicit in the charter. They put all their cards on the table, and so if people just would read that, I think they'd have a better view."
Nawid Farhad, president of the Afghan Student Association, said people shouldn't generalize or take sides during political conflicts. The best thing for any group to do is to remain tolerant and open, he said.
"We need to be working together to come up with solutions to a problem that we have. No matter if somebody is a Muslim, a Hindu, a Christian or a Jew, we are members of the community here, and we need to work together to come up with a solution for that," Farhad said. "For example, what happened with the North Dakota flood in Missouri, all these people working together - they didn't care about where they came from or what color they were. They wanted to save the community, and this is what it's all about."
Farhad said he tries to make an impact in the community by showing people that he is different, that he can't be generalized.
Open communication and tolerance are the keys to understanding all sides of a conflict, he said.
"The elders say that nothing is more sacred than breaking bread together, than setting tea or having a meal together," Farhad said. "If we do that, then the differences will melt away."
