Ma'an - Students at eight prestigious universities in the UK, USA and Canada are gearing up to simultaneously hold 'Israeli Apartheid Week' from Saturday 10 February to Friday 16 February in order to raise awareness about Israel's increasingly apartheid-like policies in the occupied Palestinian territories and in Israel.
Recalling the UN International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the crime of Apartheid, students at the Universities of Oxford, Cambridge, London (SOAS), New York, Toronto, Montreal, Hamilton and Ottawa, will be holding lectures, cultural events, film screenings, teach-ins and demonstrations on their campuses over the next seven days in order to advance the analysis of Israel as an apartheid state.
Students, academics, economists and activists will also be calling for a wider campaign of boycott, divestment, and sanctions against Israel in order to put pressure on Israel to reverse its discriminatory policies. Oxford University Arab Cultural Society member Abdel Razzaq Takriti states in a press release that "an international campaign of boycott, divestment and sanctions is the only way to get an apartheid regime like Israel to adjust its policies towards the Palestinian people and to pursue peace."
The organisers state that their aims are "full equality for Arab citizens of Israel, an end to the occupation and colonization of the West Bank and Gaza, and the implementation of the right of return and compensation for Palestinian refugees pursuant to UN resolution 194."
This is the third consecutive year that Israeli Apartheid Week is taking place in university campuses.
At the University of London's School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), speakers will include Israeli writer and poet Yitzhak Laor, British writer and journalist Jonathan Cook, Israeli filmmaker Eyal Sivan, and academics Nadim Rouhana and Toufic Haddad.
Avi Shlaim, an Israeli author and academic; Salim Vally, a social justice activist and educationalist from South Africa; and Palestinian academic Karma Nabulsi, will be among the speakers at Oxford University.
Dr. Jamal Zahalka, a Palestinian-Arab member of the Israeli Knesset, will also be speaking in Oxford University in the UK, in addition to Toronto, Montreal and Ottawa universities in Canada. Professor Norman Finkelstein will be speaking at Hamilton University.
Zahalka said in a press release: "Israel is implementing apartheid policies in Palestine by building the apartheid separation wall, bypass roads for Jews only in the West Bank, restrictions on movement of Palestinians, hundreds of checkpoints, in addition to the siege and daily violation of basic human rights of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.” He adds, "Even Palestinian citizens of Israel are in fact second degree citizens that suffer systematic discrimination in all aspects of their lives."
Cambridge University Palestine Society member Sirine Rached recalls in a press release that "now as ever, peace in the Middle East can only be achieved through putting an end to the Israeli occupation, the return of Palestinian refugees to their homes and equality for Palestinian citizens of Israel."
“This week of events, being held in New York for the first time, adds to the growing international chorus of opposition to Israeli apartheid that includes voices of Palestinians, Israelis, South Africans, and many others who stand for justice,” says Ryvka Bar Zohar, an organizer of the New York Israeli Apartheid Week.
More information is available on the website:
www.endisraeliapartheid.net
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