For 77 years, Palestinians have been living (and dying) under Israeli displacement, occupation, apartheid, blockade and genocide. In 2005, students, teachers, and professors launched the BDS campaign as a nonviolent and legitimate means of resistance against the injustice imposed on the Palestinian people by Israel—and ignored and tolerated by the international community.
Israa university in the north of Gaza | Januar 2024
Since October 2023, we have been witnessing an unprecedented level of cruelty, which we can watch live-streamed on our devices.
- Official figures claim 70,000 civilians killed (although the actual number may be much higher and does not include indirect deaths) – in fact, the estimated death toll is over 100,000.
- More than 20,000 children killed—some of them deliberately murdered with shots to the head
- More than 235 journalists killed (more than in any previous war in human history)
- Repeated deadly attacks on medical rescue workers and doctors
- Reports of cruel torture and murder by torture
- Destruction of all 13 universities in Gaza
- Withholding of drinking water and food as a weapon against the population
In light of these atrocities and destruction, we cannot simply leave it at empty words.
An end to the violence can and will only come about when freedom, justice, and equality prevail. For Palestinians and Israelis alike. Regardless of religion or ethnicity.
The United Nations has called on all states to do everything in their power to prevent a potential genocide—although leading genocide researchers largely agree that such a situation does not exist here – to avert this. This is clearly not in the interest of the Federal Republic of Germany. On the contrary, it is supporting this genocide through arms deliveries to Israel worth approximately €500 million until mid-2025. Historically and today, the oppression of the Palestinian people is only possible with the support of Western states such as Germany, the UK, and the US. That is why it is up to us—workers, students, and schoolchildren—to stand up against this genocide.
The continuation of decades-long occupation, apartheid, and the ongoing genocide is made possible, in part, by the fact that all institutions in Israel—including universities—subordinate themselves to these ends.