LONDON: The student mobilization for Gaza is reaching the United Kingdom: a handful of tents, accompanied by Palestinian flags and slogans calling for a ceasefire, appeared this week on the lawn of the SOAS university in London (School of Oriental and African studies).
Students, many of them masked, sit in a circle on a blue canvas while others have stockpiled supplies.
According to Yara, a 23-year-old former student, more than twenty students are taking part in the movement at this establishment.
Other camps have sprung up at a number of British universities, as well as on American campuses.
The goal, she told AFP, is to “put pressure on the administration to adhere to students’ demands”, or to reveal links with companies complicit in what she calls “the economy of illegal colonization of Israel and the arms trade.
– “Solidarity camp” –
The University of Warwick, in central England, kicked off first with a “Gaza Solidarity Camp” on April 26.
The tents then spread around the universities of Newcastle, Edinburgh, Manchester, Cambridge and Oxford.
In Edinburgh, a group of students began a hunger strike to call for a ceasefire in Gaza.
In Cambridge, orange tents are neatly lined up around King’s College, founded in 1441.
The university said in a statement it respected freedom of expression and the right to protest, adding that it would not tolerate “anti-Semitism, Islamophobia and any other form of racial or religious hatred.”
With protests in the United States having sometimes resulted in violence, and Jewish students expressing concerns about their safety, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak wants to avoid similar scenes in the United Kingdom.
He summoned university leaders on Thursday to discuss the safety of Jewish students, and denounced the “unacceptable increase in anti-Semitism” on campuses.
The Community Safety Trust, an association which notably ensures the security of places of the Jewish community, spoke of “an unprecedented level of anti-Semitism” since the Hamas attacks on October 7 and Israel’s response.
More than 1,170 people, mainly civilians, were killed in the initial attacks, according to a report established by AFP based on official Israeli figures.
The Israeli military response left some 35,000 dead, mainly women and children, according to the Hamas health ministry.
SOAS students received support on Wednesday from the former leader of the Labor Party, the very left-wing Jeremy Corbyn.
He stressed that the university should “recognize that students have strong, legitimate, valid opinions.”
Suspended from the Labor Party, Jeremy Corbyn was accused of allowing anti-Semitism to flourish within Labor, having in the past described Hamas and its Hezbollah allies as “friends”.
– “Never mind” –
Yara, who has been at the camp since it was set up three days ago, said the students plan to stay “as long as it takes” for the university to accept their requests.
“The first night was really rainy, wet and muddy,” she says.
“But honestly, no matter how uncomfortable camping outside is for students, it’s just a fraction of the conditions Palestinians experience in Gaza,” she adds.
A 19-year-old law and international development student, who until then had only participated in demonstrations, says he wants to join the camp this weekend.
“I don’t think I can wait until I graduate, because people are dying,” said the student, who did not wish to give his name. “I said I’ll be there because they need people. I’m in”.
