Israeli Apartheid Week begins today. There will be a discussion on NYU's Tel Aviv campus tomorrow in Kimmel. See the schedule below. For more information visit www.apartheidweek.org/.
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From Johannesburg to Jerusalem: Anti-Apartheid Organizing in the US
Monday, March 2nd, 7 pm
St Mary’s Episcopal Church, 521 West 126th Street, NYC
Showing of critically acclaimed film Have You Heard from Johannesburg? Apartheid And The Club Of The West, followed by a discussion with David Wildman of the United Methodist Church and Sam Anderson, anti-apartheid activist, educator, and founding board member of The Malcom X Museum.
Event organized by the IAW New York Organizing Coalition
NYU-Tel Aviv University: A Partnership in Occupation
Tuesday, March 3rd, 8 pm
Kimmel Center, NYU (Room 802), 60 Washington Square South (between Thompson and Laguardia), NYC
Panel discussion on NYU's relationship with Tel Aviv University, featuring award-winning novelist Elias Khoury, New York University professor Andrew Ross, and Nir Harel, member of Israel's Anarchists Against The Wall.
Event organized by NYU Students for Justice in Palestine
Identification required to enter building
The Impact of Occupation: This Body Is A Prison
Wednesday, March 4th, 7:30 pm
Kimmel Center, NYU (Room 914), 60 Washington Square South (between Thompson and Laguardia), NYC
Screening of the critically acclaimed This Body Is A Prison, followed by a discussion with filmmaker Dylan Bergeson.
The film addresses the psychological impacts of growing up under occupation in different areas of the West Bank. It explores how isolation and violence existentially impact the way that children construct their sense of self. The film contains a spectrum of human experiences not commonly accessible to people in the West, as well as rare footage that takes the viewer literally inside a military invasion.
Organized by NYU Students for Justice in Palestine & the Arab Student Association at Columbia University's School of International & Public Affairs (SIPA)
Identification required to enter building
The Art of Resistance: Culture and the Boycott of Israel
Friday, March 6th, 7 pm
Judson Memorial Church, 243 Thompson St., just off of Washington Square Park, NYC
Panel discussion with best-selling author Ahdaf Soueif, founding member of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel Omar Barghouti, and NYC poet Remi Kanazi; moderated by Brooklyn College Professor Moustafa Bayoumi.
Event organized by the IAW New York Organizing Coalition
The Israeli attack on Gaza: What is needed for a just solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict?
Saturday, March 7th, 3 pm
Judson Memorial Church Assembly Hall, 239 Thompson St. (1/2 block south of Washington Square Park), NYC
Israel’s three-week-long attack on Gaza in December and January left over 1,300 Palestinians and 13 Israelis killed and thousands of Palestinians wounded. Israel’s bombardment left the infrastructure in Gaza in a shambles, with schools, hospitals, mosques destroyed, while Israel continues to blockade needed supplies of food, electricity and water.
Panelists:
Riham Barghouti, Adalah-NY, Coalition for Justice in the Middle East
Nellie Hester Bailey, Harlem Anti-War Coalition
Joel Kovel, Committee for an Open Discussion of Zionism & Author of “Overcoming Zionism”
Dorothy Zellner, Center for Constitutional Rights & “Jews Say No”
Steve Bloom, Activist Poets’ Roundtable
Moderator: Justine McCabe, Co-Chair, Green Party U.S. International Committee
Event organized by the West Side Green Party
Party Against Apartheid
Saturday, March 7th, 9 pm
Alwan for the Arts, 16 Beaver Street, 4th Floor (bet. Broad & Broadway), NYC
Event organized by the IAW New York Organizing Coalition
Monday, March 2, 2009
Israeli Apartheid Week
One Reflection on Take Back NYU sit-in
As the days pass since the NYU student occupation of Kimmel, I have finally had a chance to read some of the press Take Back NYU! has received in response to our actions. While we have received an outpouring of support from across the globe, including student activists at major universities and renowned intellectuals such as Noam Chomsky, Take Back NYU! has also come under harsh criticism from many people who have consistently misunderstood the importance and legitimacy of the student occupation of NYU.
While much of the criticism of the student occupation has been directed at the various demands of Take Back NYU!, deeming them vague and disjointed, these critics have consistently failed to analyze the actual substance of the demands themselves. They are far from disconnected or irrelevant – each demand of the occupation stems from the same framework, one demanding accountability, transparency, and social justice for all. Not only is it a glaring oversight not to see their binding thread, but it is is crucial to recognize that all progressive social movements are inextricably linked together. As Martin Luther King made clear towards the end of his life, it was impossible to struggle within the civil rights movement without simultaneously struggling against the Vietnam war and all forms of American imperialism.
The NYU student occupiers understand that demands for disclosure of the budget are profoundly related to demands for the right of graduate students to unionize. These demands reject the notion that profit should hold primacy over individual lives and reflect a desire for democracy, transparency, and protection of human rights. The ability of the student body to hold their university accountable for their actions is only possible with disclosure of the budget. Thus, the central demand of the Take Back NYU! campaign is and always has been full disclosure. We are incapable of exerting a say in the financial decisions of the administration if we remain unaware of where the money is being spent. Knowledge of the budget is necessary for future political campaigns on campus, such as divestment from Israel. While a divestment campaign is currently building on campus, we felt that the campaign had not yet gained enough momentum to be included as one of our demands. However, our solidarity with the people of war torn Gaza and the people of Palestine as a whole remains intact, and we sought for our demands to reflect this position.
While Take Back NYU! ultimately challenged the formal means of expressing political opposition, they did not take this step from the beginning. For two years, Take Back NYU! has traveled down the traditional channels of voicing political dissent – from town hall meetings to electing a student senator on our platform – all of which consistently proved unproductive. All attempts to engage in meaningful dialogue were repeatedly ignored and never once were our grievances directly addressed. The occupation of Kimmel came as a result of two years of campaigning and two years of being pushed aside, ignored, and mocked by the NYU administration. As occupiers, Take Back NYU! attempted to push the NYU administration into a position where they could no longer run away but instead would be forced to interact with us. Unfortunately, what the occupiers did not fully understand was the degree of trickery and deceit the administration would employ to expel the students from the building. They used numerous scare tactics, from calling students’ parents threatening expulsion to turning off the power and internet connection inside the building. But worst of all was their final decision to lie and deceive the negotiators. NYU informed the occupiers they would be able to meet with the administration, and in good faith, the negotiators went into a room to begin proceedings. When they entered the room, they were denied negotiations, told they were suspended until further hearings, and could not return to the rest of the occupying students. The administration’s failure to address the students’ demands reflects the fundamental factors behind the demands themselves - the lack of democracy, transparency, and student say in how their university is run.
Most of the students engaged in this protest are on financial aid, have taken out massive loans, or work jobs to pay for their education. All of the students have acted out of sincere commitment to the values of social justice, democracy, and education. So, of all of the criticisms, what may be most disturbing is the assertion that the student protesters are privileged whiners. They have worked tirelessly to receive a quality education, one they are only seeking to improve. But a student’s economic standing is ultimately beside the point. In a democratic society, all individuals, whether or not economically privileged, have an obligation to fight for the human rights of others. Those with political, social, or economic leverage hold an ever greater responsibility to utilize their position and education as a means of helping others.
Critics of the NYU student occupation better pay attention fast or they will be left behind as this new wave of student activism emerges. The Take Back NYU! occupation was inspired by the countless other student uprisings across the globe, from Greece to the New School here in New York City. In the UK alone, there have been 25 similar student occupations. Just as Take Back NYU! has learned from these student bodies that we can assert our dissent through nontraditional channels, the NYU occupation will undoubtedly inspire other students to do the same. To every student around the world struggling against injustice and political and social domination by their schools, it is absolutely crucial to remember that your school belongs to nobody but you. There would be no school without its students. It is our duty to force schools to put students over profit, transparency over secrecy, and democracy over control by the elite. It is time to rise up and resist - reclaim your space, assert your voice, and let the world know that human lives must always hold primacy over economic gain. As students we must never forget that we are struggling together to fight the same powers that seek to oppress us. And most importantly, in the words of Frederick Douglass, we must remember that “power concedes nothing without a demand.”
C. Green
