Oxford, MINA – Some 500 members of faculty and staff of the University of Oxford expressed their firm support to encampment protests in solidarity with Gaza and demanded that the university divest from “Israel’s genocide in Gaza”, Anadolu Agency reports.
A joint statement, signed by some 500 professors, associate professors, researchers, and university staff, expressed support for encampment protests and students’ demand for divestment from Israel’s genocide in Gaza, Israel’s ongoing “apartheid regime” against Palestinians and its illegal settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Describing the situation in the Gaza Strip as “catastrophic,” the statement recalled that the International Court of Justice has characterized it as plausibly amounting to genocide.
“We consider our students’ demands entirely reasonable given the University of Oxford’s commitment to global leadership in education and to furthering educational opportunities internationally,” it noted.
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The statement added: “We further call for the release of Palestinian prisoners held under administrative detention in Israeli prisons, many of them arrested as children. We also ask the university itself to take a number of other urgent measures.”
Saying that currently, Oxford holds a policy of no direct investment in arms, the signatories said that they join Oxford students in asking that the university review its ethical investment policy to explicitly restrict all investment in arms, weapons, and other instruments of war.
Israel has pounded the Gaza Strip in retaliation since October 7, 2023. More than 34,900 Palestinians have since been killed in Gaza, mostly women and children, and over 78,500 others injured, according to Palestinian health authorities. (T/RE1/P2)
Mi’raj News Agency MINA)
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