Dear Prof. Dr. Vinod Subramaniam, Prof. Dr. Ir. Tom Veldkamp and Drs. Machteld Roos,
We are a concerned group of students and faculty members at the University of Twente writing to you about the University’s ties to organisations and programmes complicit in Israel’s ongoing 75-year occupation and apartheid regime in the occupied Palestinian territories and current mass killing that has left at least 34,735 people killed and 78,108 injured in the Gaza strip since 7 October [1]. The International Court of Justice ruled this mass killing as a plausible genocide under the Genocide Convention [2]. We are also writing to express our conviction that the University of Twente should be providing adequate support to the students and staff affected by this conflict.
We come together from different studies, ethnicities, religions and backgrounds in solidarity with the movement for a permanent ceasefire and liberation of the apartheid regime in occupied Palestine. We act and identify in solidarity with the global student movement for justice and a permanent ceasefire in the occupied Palestinian territories and the ending of Israeli apartheid. We believe that the occupation and apartheid regime in Palestine is unconscionable and unjust in the extreme, and that all institutions should act against this injustice to dismantle the apartheid regime, by pressuring complicit actors that form or uphold this regime through boycotting, divesting from, or sanctioning these actors. Institutions must also stand unequivocally for a permanent ceasefire. We ourselves are steadfast in being a non-violent, inclusive, and accessible movement with a foundation of justice, intersectionality, anti-fascism, anti-colonialism, and anti-discrimination - including being strongly opposed to any and all anti-semitism.
The University emphasizes a “high tech human touch” approach, where technology, science, engineering, and social sciences are fused to impact the world around us. We believe this intention for positively impacting the world in a fair and sustainable way, is incompatible with mass killing, warfare, apartheid, and the employment of technology and engineering for these ends. If you agree with us, then we believe the University needs to be unequivocal about this by disclosing, boycotting, and divesting from these systems. As your students, we are also encouraged to be at the University of Twente for more than a degree. That is exactly what we are doing; by standing up, speaking up, and acting for justice when ongoing oppression, colonialism, and apartheid cannot be any clearer to the world.
We, including UT students and staff, demand that, as the Executive Board of the University of Twente, you:
1- Disclose all ties, including investments, joint research, joint activities and programmes, collaborations of any kind, that the University of Twente has with Israeli companies, organisations, institutions, and government bodies, as well as all companies, organisations, and institutions that profit from genocide, apartheid, and the exploitation of occupied Palestine. A non-exhaustive list of the ties that the University of Twente has with these institutions is given in Appendix A. We ask you to complete this list and publish it.
2- Boycott future, and end all current collaborations and partnerships with Israeli companies, organisations, institutions, and government bodies, as well as all companies, organisations, and institutions that profit from genocide, apartheid, and the exploitation of occupied Palestine. This includes an academic boycott and cutting of all ties with Israeli academic institutions, similar to how all Dutch universities, including the University of Twente, suspended partnerships with educational and knowledge institutions in Russia in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine [3].
3- Divest fully all direct and indirect investments, including from the Twente University Fund and any other endowment fund or investments from genocide, apartheid, and the exploitation of occupied Palestine. Ensure accountability and transparency by publishing UT’s investment decisions governing process as well as updating and publishing UT’s investment guidelines that are aligned with the spirit and letter of divestment from the Israeli apartheid.
4- Support affected Palestinian students and staff in the same way that students and staff from Ukraine were offered support immediately and without hesitation in March 2022 following Russia’s invasion and war on Ukraine [4,5]. Psychological aid and support should be given to the Palestinian students and staff. Tuition fees for Palestinian students should be reduced to the statutory tuition fee instead of the much higher institutional tuition fee normally charged to students from outside the European Economic Area, and an emergency fund as well as facilitating job and internship opportunities should be made available to them.
5- Support students, academics, and academic institutions of Palestine. Create emergency fellowships and support for researchers, educators and students from Gaza and other parts of Palestine who are interested in coming to work or study in the University of Twente, and create partnerships and collaborations with Palestinian academic institutions and universities at the earliest opportunity.
We are firm and unyielding on our demands, but open to sincere discussion and dialogue. However, the current state of the ongoing mass killing in Gaza is culminating in the ground invasion in Rafah as we type this, which the Dutch government has established as a red line in Israel’s war on the Palestinian people. Thus, the situation is dire and incredibly urgent, and we hope to receive your response to these demands no later than the end of May 17, 2024.
In solidarity with the people of Palestine and our Dutch and global students and academics fighting for a just and fair future,
Enschede Students for Palestine
Appendix A: Non-exhaustive list of collaborations and partnerships with Israeli companies, organisations, institutions, and government bodies, as well as all companies, organisations, and institutions that profit from genocide, apartheid, and the exploitation of occupied Palestine. Because of their complicity to the mass killing of the people in Palestine, partnerships and collaborations with these institutions therefore go against the UT’s core values of a fair and sustainable future.
1- Technion
a. Israeli university Technion in Haifa is a partner institution of the UT and there is the possibility of student exchanges [6].
b. Technion’s students and trained engineers work at Elbit and Rafael to develop the D9 remote-controlled bulldozer, that is used for the demolition of Palestinian homes [7]. They also aid in producing an acoustic system, called The Scream, that uses sonic blasters to suppress Palestinian demonstrations, causing irreversible hearing damage [8].
2- Thales
a. Thales is a major sponsor of the University of Twente’s various programmes and activities, including career fairs, and with student associations at the UT.
b. Thales produces weapon systems and military technology with Israeli companies, for example, GILL anti-tank missiles together with Rafael, or allegedly F-35 parts that then form part of the system of oppression and mass killing of the Palestinian people [9,10].
3- Horizon 2020 projects
a. SURROUNDEDbySCIENCE: The University of Twente is a coordinator for this project, of which the Weizmann Institute of Science is a participant [11].
b. RiskPACC: The University of Twente is a participant in this project, together with the Municipality of Eilat and Magen David Adom in Israel [12].
4- Research collaborations
a. The University of Twente has research collaborations and joint publications with the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology and the Open University of Israel in 2024, and five other such research collaborations and joint publications in 2023 [9]
[2] Application of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in the Gaza Strip (South Africa v. Israel - https://www.icj-cij.org/
[3] utwente.nl/en/education/student-services/news-even...
[4] utwente.nl/en/news-events/corporate-announcements/...
[5] utwente.nl/nieuws/2022/3/493431/twente-board-op-de...
[6] utoday.nl/news/74168/occupations-for-palestine-is-...
[7] https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1931-0846.2016.12164.x
[8] web.archive.org/web/20140929060324/whoprof......
[9] stopwapenhandel.org/tu-delft-and-the-israeli-arms-...
[10] trouw.nl/binnenland/activisten-beschuldigen-thales...
[11] http://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/101006349