BOSTON (AP) – Shalom Keller celebrated his 21st birthday in Iraq two years ago, one day before his Army unit joined the first wave of the U.S. invasion.

“Instead of getting drunk, I was invading a country that had done me no wrong,” Keller told a crowd of about 2,000 demonstrators who gathered on the Boston Common on Sunday to mark the two-year anniversary of the invasion of Iraq.

The rally, organized by the anti-war Boston Mobilization, follows dozens of similar anti-war protests Saturday in New York, San Francisco and other American cities.

A smaller anti-war rally organized by a youth activist group drew about 75 people to the town common in Amherst, about 100 miles west of Boston.

“I feel like the war has sort of become old news to a lot of people my age and people in general,” said Rosa Friedman, 17, of Amherst. She said groups such as hers need to keep reminding people to keep struggling to end the war.

In Boston, students, musicians, war veterans and parents of soldiers took turns expressing their anti-war views in speeches, songs and poetry.

Keller says he supported the war when he arrived in Iraq, but quickly became disenchanted as friends and fellow soldiers died in combat. Long before he was discharged, he decided to speak out once he returned home early this year.

“It’s a message that needs to get out,” the Newton resident said after he exited the stage to cheers.

Gina Sartori, a Northeastern University student who helped organize the rally, said the anti-war movement is still regrouping after President Bush’s re-election.

“Unfortunately, the peace movement put a lot of energy and time into organizing for (U.S. Sen. John Kerry’s presidential) campaign,” she said. “The Democrats are just as much for the war as the Republicans.”

Officer Neva Grice, a spokeswoman for Boston Police, said seven people were arrested. Additional details were not available.

Walking past the rally with her young niece, Ginny Corkery cringed when one of the performers shouted an obscenity into the microphone.

One of Corkery’s sons, an Army captain, just returned home from a tour of duty in Iraq.

“I understand their point of view, but I don’t share it,” she said of the protesters. “I don’t believe we should be policing the world, but there was a major injustice being done to the people over there in Iraq. Our troops were over there for a reason – to free people.”

AP-ES-03-20-05 1836EST