What is the encampment?
On Tuesday April 23, students and staff activists from the University of Sydney and other universities came together to camp in solidarity with student encampments at Columbia University and Barnard College. It is located in front of the University Quadrangle with protesters bringing tents and banners to campaign against Israel’s genocide against Palestine.
Columbia’s encampment has sparked solidarity encampments and protests across the United States with dozens of universities joining in Columbia’s lead. At the time of writing, active encampments are now in Texas (UT Austin), California (University of Southern California, California State Polytechnic University in Humboldt), Connecticut (Yale University and University of Connecticut), Stanford University, Emory University, and many others. An encampment has also been established at Sciences Po in Paris.
The encampments in the U.S have resulted in hundreds of arrests. Republican speakers have called for the Biden government to call in the National Guard, which, if followed through, would mark the first time since 1968’s anti-Vietnam War protests that U.S states decided to send National Guard units to suppress protests.
Why is the encampment happening?
One of the focuses that the encampment is drawing attention to is the fact that more than 34,000 Palestinians, including more than 16,000 women and children, have been killed by Israel since 7 October. At the University of Sydney, the primary focus of the encampment lies on the ties that the University has with Israeli universities such as Tel Aviv University and its relationships with weapon manufacturing companies Thales and Elbit Systems.
Earlier on March 19, student activists from Students Against War staged a successful sit-in protest at Tel Aviv University’s presence at USyd’s Study Abroad Fair, forcing TAU’s representatives to leave the Fair. Similarly, Thales and USyd maintain a strong relationship following the renewal of the University’s 5-year Memorandum Of Understanding in 2022.
However, the encampment also focuses on Israel’s system of apartheid against Palestinians, including in the Occupied Palestinian Territories in the West Bank. Palestinians living in the West Bank are subjected to military law while Israeli citizens live under Israeli civil law, creating a parallel and unequal legal system in which Jewish Israelis enjoy civil rights and access to water, food and other civic infrastructure that are tightly controlled by Israel.
In 2021, Human Rights Watch released a landmark report, ‘A Threshold Crossed: Israeli authorities and the crimes of apartheid and persecution’, acknowledging the decades-long occupation of, and discriminatory rule over, Palestine by Israel.
“Israeli authorities methodically privilege Jewish Israelis and discriminate against Palestinians. Laws, policies and statements by leading Israeli officials make plain that the objective of maintaining Jewish Israeli control of demographics, political power, and land has long guided government policy,” the report observed.
In 2004, the International Court of Justice issued a judgment against Israel’s construction of walls in Palestine in the West Bank: “The Court concluded that the construction of the wall, along with measures taken previously, severely impeded the exercise by the Palestinian people of its right to self-determination and was thus a breach of Israel’s obligation to respect that right.”
Further, Israel currently holds thousands of Palestinians without charge in its prisons. According to the Associated Press, as of August 2023, Israel imprisons more than 1,200 people without a charge or trial, with an estimated 99 per cent of the detainees being Palestinians. Earlier this month, the country drew international outrage for refusing to release the body of Walid Daqqa after his death in custody, a 62 year-old Palestinian man who was jailed over the death of an Israeli soldier, a charge Daqqa denied.
What to expect and how to get involved
The University of Sydney encampment is set to continue until its key aims are met. These are: the University’s divestment from weapons manufacturers such as Thales, the University cutting ties with Israeli education institutions, and the NSW Minns government dropping charges on pro-Palestinian protesters.
Follow the University of Sydney Students’ Representative Council’s Instagram page to follow and receive updates on the encampment campaign.