Israel-Palestine war: Brown University students launch 'hunger strike for Palestine'
A coalition of students at Brown University in Rhode Island have embarked on a hunger strike demanding that the university divest from companies profiting from the ongoing genocide in Gaza.
In a statement sent to Middle East Eye on Friday, the group said that the 19 students - made up of Palestinians, Jews, as well as others from the student community - would go on with their hunger strike until the university did its part to promote an immediate and permanent ceasefire by introducing a divestment resolution at the next meeting held by university's governing body.
The Corporation of Brown University, the university's highest governing body, will hold its first meeting of 2024 on the 8th and 9th of February.
"Given the escalating violence in Gaza, this hunger strike emphasises the urgency of passing a divestment resolution in this meeting rather than delaying the process any further," the students said in a statement shared with MEE.
Palestine Solidarity Caucus and Jews for Ceasefire Now who organised the hunger strike, said that they want the resolution to follow the recommendations of a report released in 2020 by the Advisory Committee on Corporate Responsibility in Investment Practices (ACCRIP) that called for divestment from companies involved in the occupation in Palestine.
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The report identified the following companies for divestment: AB Volvo, Airbus, Boeing, DXC, General Dynamics, General Electric, Motorola, Northrop Grumman, Oaktree Capital, Raytheon and United Technologies.
According to the Brown Daily Herald, around 350 people were in attendance when the student groups announced the hunger strike on Friday afternoon.
One Palestinian participant in the hunger strike, Nour Abaherah, said she was compelled to take action.
"As a Palestinian, I have witnessed colossal losses in Gaza, the West Bank, and around the world; the ongoing impact of this humanitarian crisis has fuelled my commitment to justice,” Abaherah, a second year master of public health student at Brown, said in the statement shared by the group.
According to the Brown Daily Herald, around 350 people were in attendance when the student groups announced the hunger strike on Friday afternoon.
One Palestinian participant in the hunger strike, Nour Abaherah, said she was compelled to take action.
"As a Palestinian, I have witnessed colossal losses in Gaza, the West Bank, and around the world; the ongoing impact of this humanitarian crisis has fueled my commitment to justice,” Abaherah, a 2nd year Master of Public Health student at Brown, said in the statement shared by the group.
“My family history, intertwined with the struggles of my people and occupied people everywhere, motivates me to stand against the investment and profiting of arms and weapons manufacturing and occupation that perpetuates violence in our world," Abaherah added.
Ariela Rosenzweig, a Jewish undergraduate student who joined the strike said her participation in the hunger strike "demonstrates the university’s unwillingness to heed my calls as a Jewish student to divest from the ongoing genocide being carried out in my name...I will not allow the university I attend, the people of which I am a part, or the country I live in to claim righteousness while the ‘Jewish state’ actively perpetrates crimes against humanity.”
Brown University is an Ivy League school that has been a hub of protests since Israel began bombarding the besieged Gaza Strip on 7 October after the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel.
Students have repeatedly accused Brown of holding investments in weapons manufacturers.
The university has refused to divest, claiming that it did not directly invest in weapons manufacturers.
This hunger strike is one of several attempts to force the university to divest from Israel, in what students say is an untenable position that renders Brown complicit in the harm of others.
On 8 November 2023, 20 Jewish students with Brown U Jews for Ceasefire Now staged a sit-in at the university to demand its president bring a divestment resolution to the February Corporation meeting to support a ceasefire. The students were arrested, prompting outrage from the university community.
The university later dropped the charges.
In December, 41 students held a sit-in at the university, following the shooting of Palestinian student Hisham Awartani in Burlington, Vermont. Awartani was one of three Palestinians shot while wearing a keffiyeh.
The other two young men recovered from their injuries but Awartani was left paralysed from the chest down.
The students who staged the protest in December were eventually arrested and their arraignments are scheduled for the 12th and 14th of February.
In its statement to MEE, the student coalition said that support for divestment "as a material way of supporting a permanent ceasefire and lasting peace in Gaza" was growing on the campus.
"This strike is the student body’s response to Brown’s continued inaction in the face of the mounting crisis in Gaza," the students added.
The hunger strike will be accompanied by a host of programmes - including teach-ins, performances, and prayers, the students said.
Brown University's media office did not immediately respond to MEE's request for comment.
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