NEW YORK — A woman who has come to symbolize protests in Sudan after being photographed chanting atop a car during protests against President Omar Bashir said on Thursday she had received death threats since her image went viral.

Clad in white, Alaa Salah can be seen poised above the crowds in Khartoum, where demonstrators gathered to demand the military hand over power to civilians.

The ouster on Thursday of Bashir, 75, followed months of protests against his rule.

“I wanted to get on the car and speak to the people,” according to a post on a Twitter account for Salah, 22, an engineering and architecture student at Sudan International University.

“We need international support, for people to be aware of what’s happening and to understand our demands.”

The post praised the role of Sudanese women, many of whom have taken to the streets in protest.

Figures from the World Bank show that less than half of women finish secondary school in Sudan where female life expectancy is about 66 years old.

“You cannot have a revolution without women. You cannot have democracy without women,” read the tweet. “We believed we could, so we did.”

Calling herself “very proud to take part in this revolution,” Salah said her life has been threatened since her picture and video went viral on social media.

“I will not bow down. My voice can not be suppressed,” according to a tweet on her account, adding that she would hold Bashir responsible “if anything happens to me.”

The Thomson Reuters Foundation could not reach Salah for comment or verify that she wrote the tweets herself on her account rather than representatives. — Thomson Reuters Foundation