April 21, 2024

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