To our universities,
We, the Student Movement for Palestinian Liberation, demand institutional accountability and immediate divestment from israel and its genocide of the Palestinian people of Gaza. As our Palestinian counterparts face the systematic eradication of their homes, holy sites, and universities, the assassination of their professors, peers, and families, and the seizure of their homeland, we stand resolutely with their struggle for liberation.
We as students will reclaim our power on campus—there will be no classes or compliance with our institutions so long as their shameless profiteering off of our genocide persists. Through the student movement for a Popular University, we will transform our mass mobilization into sustained, tangible power—we will not stop until our universities divest and Palestine is free.
The strength of our political conviction is proven by the lengths our institutions have gone to suppress our movement. For the last six months, our universities have arrested, expelled, suspended, and threatened us, de-chartered our organizations, and engaged in anti-Arab and Islamophobic hate speech. They believe they can suppress our struggle for Palestinian freedom; we disagree.
University administrators and boards of trustees have drawn their line in the sand: profit and reputation are more important than the lives of Palestinians and the will of their students. This only fuels our political clarity—as the united mass of students, faculty, and staff face the true nature of our institutions, we release this open letter with an unrelenting message: we will not rest till our universities divest.
Empowered by the strength of students and SJPs at columbia, rutgers, yale, stanford, and beyond, Popular University For Gaza reflects our steadfast conviction for the liberation of Palestine, our unity as students, and our commitment to divestment. We demand an end to institutional investment in the colonization of Palestine and institutional repression of our movement. We firmly reject the idea that these settler colonial institutions, whose existence is predicated on the dispossession and disenfranchisement of the indigenous peoples of Turtle Island, represent us. We will take back our universities to pursue true justice and liberation for all.
It is with this commitment that we announce our dedication to the mission and vision of Popular University for Gaza, a demonstration of our indivisible strength and unity as students. As we across Turtle Island (the so-called united states and canada) and around the world establish encampments and popular, liberated spaces on our campuses, we are united in the following mission:
To completely divest our tuition dollars from—and to cut all institutional ties to—the zionist entity as well as all companies complicit in the colonization of Palestine.
To stand with our friends, relatives, and colleagues in Palestine as they resist zionist attempts to exterminate our people.
To re-forge a university divorced from the fundamentally immoral economic and political system of the united states—to create a place in which teaching and learning happen for the benefit of the masses and the global community.
The Student Movement is mobilized, unified, and determined to achieve our demands for Palestinian liberation and an end to the genocide in Gaza. We will seize control of our institutions, campus by campus, until Palestine is free.
Signed,
Students for Justice in Palestine at NYU
Bloomberg School of Public Health Students for Justice in Palestine
Students for Justice in Palestine at The Ohio State University
Students for Justice in Palestine at OSU
Williams Students for Justice in Palestine
Rice SJP
SJP Northwestern
UWaterloo Voices For Palestine
UTSJP
Boston University Students for Justice in Palestine
SVA SJP
SJPHTX
Emerson Students for Justice in Palestine
SJP UC
Denison Students for Justice in Palestine
Stanford Students for Justice in Palestine
Students for Justice in Palestine at VCU
Boulder Students for Justice in Palestine
Vassar Students for Justice in Palestine
Uni-e-s pour la Palestine Université Laval
Pomona Divest from Apartheid
Jewish Voice for Peace at Vanderbilt
UMass Lowell Students Justice for Palestine
SJP Oswego
PAO
NUSL SJP
Clark SJP
Students for Justice in Palestine TMU
Palestine Solidarity Coalition UNH
Rutgers Endowment Justice Collective
NYU Palestine Solidarity Coalition
Bears for Palestine, UC Berkeley
SJP at UC San Diego
Students for Justice in Palestine at Kent State University
Carleton SJP
Louisville SJP
University of Delaware SJP
SJP Rutgers New Brunswick
Tufts SJP
Palestine Solidarity Coalition at Dartmouth
Cornell Coalition for Mutual Liberation
UMB SJP
Moritz Law Students for Justice in Palestine at The Ohio State University
University of Regina SJP
Students for Justice in Palestine at NYU
UMass Amherst SJP
USC Divest from Death
SJSWANA (Social Justice for Southwest Asia and North Africa), UNC Charlotte
Adelphi University Students for Justice in Palestine
UF Students for Justice in Palestine
University of Kansas Students for Justice in Palestine
Temple University SJP
USC SJP/USC SCALE
NIU SJP
SJP at William & Mary
Students for Justice in Palestine at Grand Valley State University
Students for Justice in Palestine Loyola Marymount University (SJP LMU)
Gallaudet SJP
Students for Justice in Palestine at Lehman College
Binghamton SJP
UCSC SJP
SJP Butler
SJP at Florida international university
Swarthmore SJP
USC NLG
Meredith College Students for Justice in Palestine
SJP CalArts
Students for Justice Palestine @ UMass Boston
Students for Justice in Palestine at The College of New Jersey
SJP at Mason
SJP Howard U
Trojans for Palestine, USC
Miami University Students for Justice in Palestine
USC Divest
Georgetown University Students for Justice in Palestine
Oxford Palestine Society
Caltech Students for Justice in Palestine
SJP at the University of Arizona
SJP at Pitt
Penn Freedom School for Palestine
UNL SJP
Students for Justice in Palestine
UCSC Divest
UGA Students for Justice in Palestine
Vanderbilt Students for Justice in Palestine
The Cooper Union SJP
CMU STUDENTS FOR PALESTINE
Suffolk Students for Justice in Palestine
African and African American Resistance Organization (AFRO)
Chapman SJP
SJP at UARK
SJPCPP
SJP at CSULA
Montclair Students for Justice in Palestine
SJP Purdue
UNT Palestine Solidarity Committee
SJP at UD
NYU LSJP
Swarthmore SJP