CAMPUS GAZA PROTESTS

N.S. university approves academic amnesty for students in pro-Palestinian encampment
CBC
Fri, 14 June 2024 

The pro-Palestinian encampment on the Dalhousie University campus as seen in May. (Julie Sicot/Radio-Canada - image credit)


Dalhousie University will grant academic amnesty to students participating in the pro-Palestinian encampment on campus.

In a motion originally proposed by the Dalhousie Student Union, the university's senate has voted to allow students to miss one class or assessment per course to participate in activities related to the encampment until the end of August.

Students must give professors at least 24-hours notice in order to attend "the event" that does not include final exams or assessments.


Dozens of tents were erected in May on Dalhousie's Studley campus, organized by the Students for the Liberation of Palestine. The organization is a coalition of students from Dalhousie, Saint Mary's, The University of King's College and NSCAD.

Organizers and participants plan to stay on campus until the university completely divests from Israel.

Mariam Knakriah, the student union president, said in a statement that the union is "proud of our achievement in securing the passage of the academic amnesty motion through the Dalhousie Senate."

Knakriah says the union also urges the university to be more proactive in listening to what the students want.

"We urgently call on Dalhousie University to listen, engage, and act in accordance with its strategic objectives of social responsibility and community engagement," Knakriah said. "It is crucial that we address the horrible crimes that force our students to sleep outdoors under harsh conditions, and we must act swiftly and decisively."

More than 37,0000 Palestinians have been killed since October, according to the Gaza health ministry.

Israel land and air attacks on Gaza followed after events on Oct. 7 when Hamas-led militants stormed the Israeli border, took 250 hostages and killed around 1,200 people, according to numbers from the Israeli government.

While the Students for the Liberation of Palestine welcomed the academic amnesty on Instagram, the group also criticized the motion that limits students to only miss one class or assessment per course. Their post specified that the "academic amnesty also does not mention why the encampment is occurring."

Calls for more academic amnesty motions

The organization also calls on King's College, Saint Mary's, NSCAD and Mount Saint Vincent University to adopt academic amnesty motions.

Ajay Parasram, an associate professor at Dalhousie and part of a group of professors who have supported the students, called the university's approval a good first step.

"What all of us want more is the university to commit to divesting — boycotting and divesting," Parasram said. "That's the stuff that's going to actually make a material difference, we think, in terms of putting pressure on the Israeli government to end its genocidal activities."

Israel has repeatedly denied accusations of genocide, saying it is attempting to protect civilians in its military operations.

Although the academic amnesty expires on Aug. 31, Students for the Liberation of Palestine vows to stay on the campus "until Dalhousie University adopts all of our demands."

These demands include the institution's complete divestment from Israel.


Pro-Palestinian encampment members reject McGill's 'laughable' latest offer

Offer is 'immaterial response' to protesters' demands, groups say

CBC
Thu, 13 June 2024 at 12:46 pm GMT-6·1-min read



Members of a pro-Palestinian encampment who have been occupying part of McGill University's downtown Montreal campus since April say the school's latest offer falls far short of what's needed to get them to leave.

Several groups involved in the encampment issued a joint statement describing the latest offer as "laughable" and an "immaterial response" to their demands.

McGill issued a new offer on Monday that included a proposal to review its investments in weapons manufacturers and grant amnesty to protesting students.

The university said it also offered to disclose more investments to include holdings below $500,000 and to support Palestinian students displaced by the war in the Gaza Strip.

Police arrest 15, use tear gas on crowd as pro-Palestinian activists occupy McGill University building

The encampment members say the administration continues to delay taking substantive action on divestment and that the university's latest offer contains no concrete plan to cut ties with Israeli institutions.

They say their demands are straightforward, beginning with the immediate reallocation of funds from investments in companies tied to Israel's military.



UK

LSE students lose first stage of legal battle over pro-Palestine encampment

Callum Parke, PA Law Reporter
Fri, 14 June 2024 at 6:53 am GMT-6·3-min read

A group of London School of Economics’ (LSE) students have lost the first stage of a legal battle over a pro-Palestine encampment set up inside a university building.

The group set up the encampment within the atrium of the ground floor of the Marshall Building in central London on May 14.

The university began legal action to remove the encampment earlier this month, seeking a court order forcing the students to disband it.

At a hearing at Central London County Court on Friday, District Judge Kevin Moses issued an interim possession order, requiring the group to leave the premises within 24 hours once the order is served.

He said: “They are aware of the difficulties they are causing the claimants. They are aware of the difficulties they are causing to other users of the premises.”

Judge Moses said that, while the students had the right to protest, “what it does not do is give parties an unfettered right to occupy other parties’ premises with a view to protesting, particularly when they are required to leave”.

The group set up the encampment after the release of the Assets in Apartheid report by the LSE Students’ Union’s Palestine Society.

The report alleges that LSE has invested £89 million in 137 companies involved in the conflict in Gaza, fossil fuels, the arms industry, or nuclear weapons production.

Dozens of students have since been sleeping at the encampment for more than a month and had vowed to remain there until LSE met a series of demands, including divestment and democratisation of the financial decision-making process.

A further hearing will be held over the encampment’s future at a later date (Jordan Pettitt/PA)

LSE previously said it would carefully consider the report and hoped for “peaceful dialogue”.

Riccardo Calzavara, representing the university in court, said the students “stormed the building” and “barricaded” themselves in the atrium last month.

He said: “They may have had permission to enter the building, as they appear to be students, but they did not have permission to enter the building in order to encamp on part of it, nor have they ever had permission to remain there.”

Mr Calzavara said in written submissions that the encampment posed an “intolerable fire risk” and caused “considerable cost, and disruption, to the claimant and other users of the Marshall Building”.

He added that LSE did not seek to evict the students because of their protest, but “because they have taken over a building of ours unlawfully”.

He also acknowledged that while there was “nothing to prevent” the students from returning to the building once the court order expired, they could not “occupy it to the exclusion of others”.

A demonstration was held outside the Royal Courts of Justice on Friday (Callum Parke/PA)

Daniel Grutters, representing three of the students, said members of the encampment were willing to make any necessary adjustments to the camp in response to safety concerns, “but for leaving”, and were not blocking other people from accessing the building.

He said: “This, in its essence, is an attempt by all of the defendants to educate the LSE about its implicity in what it calls crimes against humanity, genocide and apartheid.”

He continued: “To the extent that the claimant is relying on health and safety risks, the defendants are willing to comply with any and all health and safety adjustments and recommendations made.”

He added: “Seeking to remove them, only to allow them to re-enter but for spending the night, is not a decision that is maintainable.”

A further hearing in the case will be held at a later date.




Gaza campus protests: two human rights law experts write new principles for universities

David Mead, Professor of UK Human Rights Law, University of East Anglia 

and Jeff King, Professor of Law, UCL

Thu, 13 June 2024 

A student encampment in Durham. Framalicious/Shutterstock

Israel’s assault on Gaza, following Hamas’ attack in October 2023, has become the subject of international legal proceedings and mass protest. Over the past eight months, university students have set up encampments at dozens of universities in Europe and North America. In most cases, they are protesting their university’s financial ties to Israeli companies and universities.

Universities have long been considered “hotbeds” of protest. Research has found a correlation between the number of universities in an area and higher overall levels of protest activity, suggesting that they are indeed fertile ground for activism.

Free speech and academic freedom are a key part of how universities operate. But they also have to deliver education and protect students and staff from harassment. The balance can be delicate.

University leaders have struggled with how to respond to the latest round of protests. Some, like at Trinity College Dublin, have agreed to protesters’ demands to divest from Israeli companies. Protesters at the University of Cambridge agreed to move after university leaders said they would negotiate.

In May, the University of Birmingham issued a notice to quit to protesting students, indicating they had trespassed and threatening to call the police. Days later, 16 Oxford students were arrested under public order legislation after entering and seeking to occupy the vice chancellor’s office.

US universities have taken a more aggressive approach, calling for police intervention to clear encampments. More than 2,100 arrests have been made, and police have employed militarised tactics, including the use of tear gas, rubber bullets and other violent techniques to break up protests.

These were unacceptably disproportionate responses to what was mostly peaceful protest. Many suppose that such scenes would not happen in the UK. But in fact, UK law gives police incredibly potent powers to deal with public protest, with recent legislation being the most extreme.

Read more: Policing bill is now law: how your right to protest has changed

The disjointed response to protest so far may owe something to the mess of complex and novel legislation and case law. The political context also raises questions about the law and policy on harassment and discrimination, especially as it relates to the question of antisemitism.

This is why we, as scholars of constitutional law and protest, have set out our views on how these protests should be handled. Both of us have worked in advisory capacity with parliamentary select committees dealing with constitutional and human rights questions. One of us (Jeff) chaired a university academic board working group on the definition of antisemitism, while David is (in his co-author’s view) the leading scholar on protest law.

We have drafted a detailed set of principles setting out what we believe are fair terms for universities and students alike. These take into account existing law and policy, and ultimately aim to prevent harmful escalation without inhibiting the freedom of peaceful assembly.
The principles

While the extended and detailed account can be read here, what follows is a high-level summary. The principles mostly detail relevant law, but in some cases also express our view of university best practice requires.

Students have the right to freedom of expression and of peaceful assembly and association, under Articles 10 and 11 of the European convention on human rights (ECHR). UK public universities are required to respect and secure those rights under the Human Rights Act 1998. These laws protect a freedom of peaceful protest even if it is disruptive or even offensive to some.


The freedom of expression and peaceful assembly extends to student occupations of buildings and other university spaces. This can even include lengthy ones that breach domestic law.


Calls for boycott and divestment from companies implicated in human rights abuses is a common and protected form of civil rights advocacy, and is not in itself antisemitic.


Human rights law recognises that the right to protest may be restricted where it is necessary in a democratic society. A university has rights as a landowner, and contractual obligations to maintain its core educational functions, including fulfilment of the right to education under the ECHR.


A tent encampment aimed at protesting a university’s investment programme (and which limits noise and other disruptions from unduly interrupting revision, teaching, examining and other core educational functions) would fall within the sphere of protected speech and assembly. Universities must accommodate them.


On the other hand, universities and their students are not legally required to withstand a permanent and seriously disruptive occupation that brings campus life and activities to a halt. Protests that directly obstruct teaching and examining (for example, occupying a lecture theatre in the middle of teaching) to a major extent can be subject to legitimate restriction.

Students have the right to freedom of expression and of peaceful assembly and association under the European convention on human rights. Joe Kuis/Shutterstock

Protesters can also, in some grave situations, be liable to criminal prosecution. For example, by using threatening or abusive language, or inciting racial or religious hatred, aggravated trespass or failure to comply with police directions.


Universities can restrict disruptive protesting to students and staff, and ask uninvited persons to leave. However, they should not exclude guests invited there for political discussion only.


The use of criminal law against students (for example, by calling the police) has grave consequences and will normally be a disproportionate act of escalation. UK statute and case law relating to the application of criminal law to public protest stands a significant chance of being found to violate the ECHR. Universities should not call the police where civil remedies (such as possession) are a suitable alternative.


Universities have a moral duty to ensure that campus is free of harassment and racism as defined under the Equality Act 2010, and that it is safe for all members of the university (and non-members legitimately present on campus).


Universities should record and investigate any complaints about harassment or discrimination arising within or from encampments. However, complaints alone are not a sound basis for policy. To amount to discrimination under equality law, complaints must be assessed and determined on an objective basis.


Protesters should recognise the role of self-restraint and self-vigilance in respect of the university’s educational mandate and duty to prevent harassment.
What we want to see

In publishing these principles, we hope to clarify a university’s powers to act, and students’ rights to protest peacefully (but disruptively) within the bounds of human rights law.

We hope universities will recognise and respect these principles. And we hope that protesters might gain a better understanding of when the law is and is not on their side – and where sympathies may fray.

But we also underline here that the law is only part of the picture. Whether or not a university can act is not the same as whether it should. Above all, it is crucial to remember that universities are unique, educational communities where political disagreement should be nourished, not quelled.

Just as we, as academics, enjoy statutory protection of our academic freedom, we should expect universities to show tolerance toward students as they navigate the sometimes treacherous foothills of participatory democracy.

This piece has been updated to say that Trinity College Dublin, not University College Dublin, agreed to protesters’ demands to divest from Israeli companies.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

The Conversation

Jeff King has received funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council, Alexander von Humboldt Foundation and the Leverhulme Trust. He is a member of University and College Union and is currently Director of Research of the Bingham Centre for the Rule of Law.

David Mead is a member of the University and College Union, and Liberty's Policy Council. He has previously received funding from the Article 11 Trust