76 universities in #Spain decided to sever cooperation relations with #Israeli#universities and research centers and linked the return of cooperation to the occupation universities’ condemnation of the #occupation army’s invasion of the #Gaza Strip.
Israel had destroyed literally all universities in Gaza and damaged over 400 schools. Lest we forget also Israel's deliberate targeting of university professors and academics.
“We are seeing the illusion of American freedom, the illusion of American freedom of speech, crumbling behind us. The system and this university have decided to showcase that they would rather subjugate, oppress and silence students than allow us to have a peaceful demonstration where we hope to educate each other. We will not be silenced.”
Hadi, a student demonstrator at the University of Texas, Austin
A banner is pictured as a coalition of University of Michigan students set up a camp to pressure the university to divest its endowment from companies that support Israel or could profit from the ongoing conflict in Gaza, on the University of Michigan college campus in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on April 23, 2024 [Rebecca Cook/Reuters]
It's for "corporations and research organizations". Does that include #universities? Not clear. The focus is not on creating and sharing useful research, but on creating "brand IP assets".
(an animal fable about incentive structures)
Universities:
"StUDeNTS arE cheaTINg uSIng AI!! soMethiNG musT bE dONE!!!"
Also Universities:
"We're low-key going to retract all those papers published in 2023... turns out our Academics were cheating using AI, ha-ha, what can you do - you just can't get the staff. let's talk no more of it, no harm done, eh, old chap?"
#Palestine / This is what ethnocide looks like: Israel deliberate destruction of Palestinian academia.
On January 17th, the last remaining intact university in Gaza, Al-Aqsa University, was bombed and completely destroyed by the Israeli military. The bombing of #Gaza's universities is not collateral damage, but part of Israel's deliberate policy to destroy Palestinian academic and cultural life.
Israeli academic institutions have not spoken out against this destruction and its consequences.
Over the past 40 years, Palestinian universities have faced systematic harassment by #Israel, including campus closures and restrictions on faculty, students and academic cooperation.
Since October 7, the situation has severely intensified. In the occupied West Bank, most studies are online due to restrictions. In Gaza, all academic institutions have been destroyed, along with schools, libraries, archives and other educational sites.
Hundreds of students and faculty members have been killed in the bombings. At least 94 university staff members in Gaza are reported dead. Prominent academics have been specifically targeted and killed.
This represents an almost complete destruction of Palestinian academic life that will take years to rebuild. Surviving students and staff are traumatized, grieving and displaced.
Palestinian intellectual life is critical for society. Israel's systematic targeting of #academia is aimed at erasing not just physical infrastructure but Palestinian cultural and spiritual life.
Dr. Anat Matar (ענת מטר): "As Israeli academics, we must raise our voices against the killing of students and colleagues, mass arrests, and the annihilation of education in Gaza."
@oatmeal@academicchatter@palestine@israel The outrage from academics in the West is staggering in its silence. The same silence that has been heard from Western medical associations and press unions. Silence can be very loud in its complicity, and in times of genocides and massacres, silence is utterly depraved and shameful.
In this clip from ‘In The Swim’ from Screen Archive South East we see Crawley’s newly built swimming pool in 1964 - the perfect way for new towners to keep fit and relax!
Israel has destroyed all the universities in Gaza. Every single one of them. That is a war crime, pure and simple. It’s the obliteration of education and Palestinian future. Every university in the world should be outraged.
If uni rankings are useful at all, it's not on reputation. We could use rankings on (say) % of students on financial aid; % of faculty tenured or tenure-track; % of tenured faculty who are women, minorities; ratio of teachers to administrators; ratio of avg faculty salary to head football coach salary…