Armidale Friends of Palestine and the community protested Israel’s war on Gaza by unfurling a six-metre flag on the University of New England (UNE) campus on May 26.
Students led chants calling for a ceasefire and a free Palestine.
Shaz, a student engagement leader at the Indigenous Students Association, spoke about their experience of colonialism as a First Nations person, reminding the protest that Sorry Day is an opportunity to acknowledge many wrongdoings — resulting from bad policies.
“How are we acknowledging one genocide and not the other?,” asked Shaz. “I feel we should also have our brothers and sisters in Gaza in our hearts today.“
Tian, secretary of the NSW Young Greens, told the protest: “We have the right to know whether our university is taking part in Israel’s genocidal settler colonial project.”
Elena, from the Australian Communist Party, told the protest: “I cannot campaign for accessible housing without remembering the people of Gaza living in tents. I cannot want better access to medical care without remembering that every hospital in Gaza has been bombed, that surgeons are being forced to work without anaesthesia.”
Speakers referred to a letter sent to UNE’s VC Chris Moran calling for the university to disclose and end any ties to Israel, financial or otherwise.
“The UNE may be a regional university, but it has ties across the globe. It cannot avoid answering the same questions that other universities have been made to answer,” the letter read in part.
The groups are calling on university management to sign the international Boycott Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) statement and publicly disclose ties (financial or otherwise) with Israel’s government, Israeli companies, particularly weapons’ companies, including but not limited to Thales, Lockheed Martin and Elbit.
Protest organisers said the community has no real way of knowing whether they are being made complicit in a genocide because the university, an important part of the community, had not disclosed its investments and research ties.
Given that the International Court of Justice ordered Israel to halt its invasion, the organisers believe that acting ethically, with respect for human life, requires acting in haste.
The students promised to continue their efforts: they say the UNE cannot rely on its location to protect it from the answering the hard questions.
One organiser told Green Left: “We can all see the unceasing genocidal actions of Israel. We can all see that our university and government have done nothing. We will not remain silent. We will stand with other students around the globe protesting what is happening.”