In this episode of the podcast of Mada al-Carmel – The Arab Center for Applied Social Research, we discuss a policy paper issued by Mada titled, “Between the Grip of Persecution and the Limitations of Agency: Palestinian Students in Israeli Universities amid the War of Genocide on the Gaza Strip” with our guest, the paper’s author, researcher and student activist Youssef Taha.
We begin the episode by examining the state of Palestinian student activism in Israeli universities as it was on the eve of the war on Gaza. Our guest traces its ebb and flow over the past two decades, and we discuss how Israeli universities continuously devise new tools with which to restrict student activity on their campuses, something that peaked after the Karamah (Dignity) Uprising in 2021.
We also shed light on practices used within Israeli academia toward Palestinian students and their political activism following the October 7 attack. Taha argues that Israel seized the attack as a pretext to continue to police and restrict student activism, via expulsions from universities and dormitories, referrals to internal disciplinary committees, in which universities play the role of both informer and secret services, and later arrests by Israeli police. These arrests often involved open intimidation, and even descended to physical assaults and blockading students inside their dormitories.
Next, we discuss a series of bills initiated by Zionist student groups in partnership with Zionist political parties and Knesset members. This legislation seeks to delegitimize Palestinian political activity, criminalize Palestinian student groups and their members, ban raising the Palestinian flag, and obstruct any activity by Palestinian students.
The episode also explores the impact of this persecution on Palestinian students and the strategies they employ to resist it, including the establishment of the Joint Student Body, an offshoot of the national High Follow-Up Committee. This development occurred against the backdrop of the historical lack of national-level Palestinian student groups over the years, due in large part to Israeli restrictions, as well as internal divisions between Palestinian parties and movements.
Finally, we consider the role of the Joint Student Body after October 7, especially in providing legal support to detained students and those referred to disciplinary committees, as well as offering assistance to their families, and exerting pressure on Israeli academia by mobilizing foreign universities and colleges, and wielding the academic boycott card.
To read the research paper in English, click here
To read the research paper in Arabic, click here
العنوان:
