Midweek update, June 16-19
News from Poland and Romania, another successful occupation in the UK, new camp in Germany and the Netherlands, and more updates from around the world
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Canada
On Wednesday, the students of the University of Toronto were in court fighting an injunction from their university, which would give administrators the legal basis to bring in law enforcement to clear the encampment.
On Tuesday, the University of Waterloo students occupied a new building on campus “after weeks of lies and bad faith from administration.” Even after the police arrived, students continued their protests, forcing the university to shut down the board of governors meeting.
According to a Tuesday Instagram post by Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights McGill, the McGill University administration has officially ceased all negotiations with the students. The McGill and Concordia University students have been encamped for 55 days. The encampment is running a Youth Summer Program for local students during the break.
Germany
On Monday, students all over Berlin staged a walk-out at 2pm in protest of the ongoing genocide in Gaza and the German universities’ complicity.
Then, after security asked a visitor to leave the Humboldt Forum Museum for carrying their tote bag with a watermelon and keffiyeh pattern, students and activists gathered at the museum to have an open discussion about the incident. The museum’s leadership was quick to call the police.
Student Encampments continue in Aachen, Cologne, Düsseldorf, Freiburg, and Munich. On Wednesday, students in Dortmund set up a second encampment on the campus of Fachhochschule Dortmund.
Netherlands
On Saturday, students at Maastricht University disrupted a gala for the Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, which has an exchange partnership with Hebrew University in occupied East Jerusalem. A security guard sexually assaulted a student, groping her and maintaining his grip despite the student and surrounding students pleading for the security guard’s hand to be removed. A video of the disruption and the assault is on the Instagram page for the Maastricht Student Encampment.
Students from Amsterdam and the Netherlands established an encampment on Monday at the Science Park of the University of Amsterdam. Law enforcement cleared the encampment later the same day.
On Wednesday, students at Leiden University dropped a banner and protested against their university’s ties to Israeli institutions. Protestors produced a detailed report on these ties and demanded total divestment.
Poland
Students at the University of Warsaw held a solidarity demonstration in front of the police station in support of the 32 students scheduled for interrogation. Their action follows the dean’s decision to call the police to disperse their encampment on June 12.
Today, there were protests organized across ten Polish cities to oppose the genocide and occupation of Palestine.
Romania
On Friday, students from the University of Bucharest defied security by carrying flags and keffiyehs at their graduation ceremony. They protested the administration’s lack of response to their demands to disclose and divest from Israeli institutions or companies. This follows the university’s deployment of riot police on June 12 to move the student encampment away from the graduation ceremony site, with negotiations postponed until after the event.
Today, one month into their encampment, University of Bucharest students received a notice from university leadership stating they were being charged and must de-encamp immediately. The notice was based on false accusations that students used “Nazi messages” and caused property damage.
UK
Students at the University of Warwick successfully occupied a new building on Sunday and demanded a meeting with administrators. The building is used by the Warwick Manufacturing Group, which does “collaborative research with companies of all scales and complexities.”
On Sunday, students at the University of Liverpool disrupted a meeting held by the university’s senior leadership team. The meeting was on “free speech”, and when students were not allowed inside, they chanted outside the meeting, “calling the university out for its involvement in the genocide of Palestinian people.”
On Tuesday, the London School of Economic administration evicted the LSE encampment after 35 days.
Thank you for the news from student encampments around the world. At the Oxford Action for Palestine encampment, under pressure from escalation from one to two encampments, the university has agreed to regular, ongoing meetings to discuss OA4P’s demands. https://x.com/oxact4pal/status/1801892718714462333 (N.B. I am a member of the wider community not a spokesperson for the encampment.)