Today students at over 70 universities across the world will hold demonstrations on campus and email their Vice-Chancellors calling for a full withdrawal of investments in companies complicit in Israeli war crimes and apartheid.
Students will focus on universities’ investments in companies such as Rolls-Royce, BAE, HP and Booking.com. Rolls-Royce and BAE produce the weapons used to attack Palestinians living under blockade in Gaza, and HP provides the technology used at Israel’s checkpoints. Booking.com advertises accommodation in illegal Israeli settlements, on land stolen from Palestinians.
“How can our Vice-Chancellor think it’s acceptable to invest money in companies involved in war crimes?” says Manal at Nottingham. “There’s a lot of talk about ‘decolonizing’, but we need to see some actual change if this is really going to happen”.
Sima at Warwick says “as students at Warwick, we’re appalled that money from this campus goes into sustaining an apartheid state. We call on our Vice-Chancellor to divest from these companies without hesitation”.
Earlier this week more than 25 prominent academics signed an open letter to universities worldwide to divest for Palestine. Signatories included Professor Gilbert Achcar (SOAS), Professor Ilan Pappe (Exeter), Professor Dina Matar (SOAS), Professor Robin D. G. Kelley (UCLA), Professor Emerita Caroline Rooney (Kent) and Professor Mohamed El-Gomati OBE (York).
Shamiul Joarder, Head of Public Affairs at FOA, says “the government is currently trying to suppress our freedom to boycott, divest from and sanction Israel (BDS). But the #Divest4Palestine campaign shows that students and academics along with the rest of the British public are increasingly showing that they’ve got no tolerance for complicity in Israeli war crimes and apartheid”.
Student action across the world will be united under the hashtag #Divest4Palestine on social media today.
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