A large number of students in a show of solidarity with Palestine at over 20 universities across the UK have called for divestment from Israeli apartheid and urged their vice chancellors to oppose the oppressive “anti-BDS Bill.”
In a statement released on Wednesday, Friends of Al-Aqsa (FOA ) said that a Palestine Day of Action had been coordinated to denounce a parliamentary bill that seeks to ban public bodies from boycotting Israeli goods.
“The ‘anti-BDS Bill’ threatens the rights of public bodies, including universities, to divest from Israeli companies involved in inflicting apartheid on Palestinian men, women and children,” FOA said in a statement.
In June, the UK government introduced a parliamentary bill that seeks to ban public bodies from boycotting Israeli goods, sparking outcry from Palestinian advocacy groups and rights activists.
Under the guise of “antisemitic rhetoric and abuse,” the legislation will prevent public organizations in the UK from boycotting the apartheid regime through sanctions and divestment campaigns.
“Students from Kent to Newcastle will urge “their Vice Chancellors to oppose this dangerous legislation, and students across the country will call for their institutions to divest from companies complicit in Israeli human rights abuses in Palestine, including Rolls-Royce PLC, Hewlett Packard (HP), BAE Systems and Booking.com,” the statement noted.
“Rolls-Royce manufactures crucial components of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighters used by Israel to attack Gaza. Meanwhile, HP maintains hardware for the Israeli police, who enforce apartheid on Palestinians within Israel,” FOA added.
Pro-Palestinian activists say UK anti-BDS bill gives Israel ‘protective shield’ over crimes.
Aisha, an undergraduate student at Salford, said: “As students at Salford, we’re here today to make it clear that it’s unacceptable for our university to fund human rights abuses. We came here to learn, not to fund apartheid. Our Vice Chancellor must act now. He must divest from unethical investments and stand up for the right to boycott the apartheid state of Israel.”
The Palestinian Authority Foreign Ministry has called on all countries to put individuals tied to settler terrorist organizations or companies investing in illegal Israeli settlements across the occupied Palestinian territories on their terror lists.
This comes as the Israeli regime has been pressing ahead with its illegal settlement expansion in the Palestinian territories despite international outcry. The policy has seen the support of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s extremist cabinet.
The United Nations has already published a list of companies with business ties to Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories.
The international pro-Palestine Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement has said the database was “a very significant first concrete step by any UN entity towards holding to account Israeli and international corporations”.
The BDS movement, which is modeled after the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa, was initiated in 2005 by over 170 Palestinian organizations that were pushing for “various forms of boycott against Israel until it meets its obligations under international law.”
Thousands of volunteers worldwide have since then joined the BDS movement, which calls for people and groups across the world to cut economic, cultural, and academic ties to Tel Aviv, to help promote the Palestinian cause.
