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AS CLASSES START, UNIVERSITIES BEGIN A NEW WAVE OF REPRESSION AGAINST
THE PALESTINE MOVEMENT  
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Maryam Alaniz
August 24, 2024
Left Voice
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_ University administrators are unleashing a fresh wave of attacks to
discipline the Pro-Palestine movement. These draconian measures show
the links between universities and the Zionist interests of the
bipartisan regime. _

, Photo Credit: Yuki Iwamura/AP

 

Media outlets across the country have been reporting on the latest
measures university administrators have been taking to prevent
pro-Palestine demonstrations as the new school year begins. 

The University of California and the California State University
system – which is the nation’s largest public university system
– have both announced they will enforce
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“zero tolerance” policy toward new encampments. Both Rutgers
University and George Washington University have suspended Students
for Justice in Palestine (SJP) at their campuses, with George
Washington also suspending Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP). Meanwhile,
Columbia University, which was the epicenter of the student movement,
maintains a near-total lockdown that has closed the campus off to the
public and is considering granting campus police the power to arrest
students. 
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These pre-emptive measures, among others across university campuses in
the U.S., are meant to stoke fear among the defiant students, faculty
members, and workers who have been standing up against the inhumane
genocide in Palestine. The attacks are within a framework of a new
McCarthyism across universities which deny even the basic right to
protest. 

This new McCarthyism is rooted in ideological positions like the idea
that criticism of Zionism constitutes antisemitism. Due to the
ideological importance of universities under capitalism in reproducing
the ideas of the bourgeoisie, they have become ground zero for
intimidation and attacks against students, faculty, and staff who dare
to speak out. 

After the encampment movement was brutally repressed in late May,
leading to the arrests and suspension of thousands of students across
the country (some of whom remain with charges and sanctions) the
movement as a whole was put on the defensive, opening the door for the
current wave of repression against the student movement. 

What is Behind This New Wave of Attacks? 

The administrative bureaucracies of the U.S. academy have played a key
role since the start of the movement for Palestine to discourage and
repress students and staff speaking out against the genocide. In that
sense, the university presidents and bureaucracy are strategically
linked to maintaining the interests of the bipartisan regime as well
as the material interests that many of these universities have with
the state of Israel. 

On the other hand, these administrators have not been able to repress
as much as the Right Wing of the regime would like, especially the
Trumpist Right, which is on the offensive against the “woke”
university (which, despite its claims of progressiveness, also serves
Zionism and capital). The congressional hearings helmed by Republican
chairwoman Elise Stefanik has already led to a slew of resignations at
elite college campuses, from the University of Pennsylvania to
Harvard, Cornell, and now Columbia.

Last week, Minouche Shafik, the president of Columbia submitted her
resignation just days after three Columbia College deans resigned
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being placed on leave
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late June for text messages, as part of an investigation into
“antisemitism.” Though these administrators sat among the upper
echelons of the university bureaucracy, their disciplining is rooted
in right-wing attacks on academic freedom and education writ large
that open space for more crackdowns against the entire movement.
Therefore, Shafik’s resignation is a sign of giving into right-wing
pressures and a political victory for that sector of the regime in
particular. 

In fact, Zionist university donors (who are simultaneously pulling
funding from
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like Columbia) and their representatives in the halls of Congress are
hoping to send a message to administrators across the country that
they need to fall in line or meet the same fate. Despite her
repressive actions against the movement, Shafik still had to step down
and will move her career to the UK. She will not be held responsible
for her attacks on basic democratic rights, for being the first
university president to suspend SJP and JVP, for her half-hearted and
slow response to a chemical attack
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Pro-Palestinian students, for suspending students and professors,or
for calling the NYPD to arrest and repress hundreds of students. 

Now Columbia’s interim president, Katrina Armstrong, is tasked with
assuaging donors and the imperialist regime that everything will be
under control at the university. As Armstrong begins her tenure,
Columbia faces an escalation in
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investigation by the House Committee on Education and the Workforce
for “on-campus antisemitism.”

At the same time, it seems that Armstrong is already making overtures
to the student body in an attempt to bring students back in line with
the interests of the university.“ We must take care to bridge
divides, find common ground, define our rules and their consequences,
and reach understanding based on our shared values,” Armstrong
wrote i
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a statement to the university community.

Unsurprisingly many students aren’t fooled by the idea of a more
“humane” university administration, especially in the context of
an ongoing genocide, which these universities profit off of. “To my
understanding, the University is simply just trying to, again, save
face in the public eye, and kind of do anything in their power to
suppress the organizing of the pro-Palestine movement,” said Cameron
Jones, a Columbia student.
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That’s because universities under capitalism are organized
ideologically, politically, and materially to maintain the interests
of the capitalist class. That’s exactly why it was possible for
a number of influential billionaires to convince NYC Mayor and
Democrat Eric Adams to work with Shafik to repress the student
encampment at Columbia
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Shafik and other bureaucrats are ultimately beholden to the
bourgeoisie. 

Advancing the Struggle against Zionism within Universities 

Clearly, the struggle against Zionism within universities has shown
the way that these institutions act like businesses and landlords
under capitalism, always looking out for their bottom line and afraid
to upset their donors. The encampments encouraged us to think of a new
kind of university: one that is free, open to the public, run by
faculty, staff, and students for the working class and oppressed. 

Therefore, rather than try to pressure administrators of these kinds
of universities in some misguided belief that they can be
intermediaries between students and workers and the regime and
business interests they are beholden to, we should turn our attention
to the political tenacity and objective power that academic workers
demonstrated during the student movement and in recent years, by
going on strike
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organizing rank and file assemblies 
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make decisions about how to best continue our struggles. 

The experience of assemblies in particular as decision-making bodies
show in an incipient way the potential for all decisions to be made
democratically at universities, starting with how we organize our
struggles and toward the fight for universities where students and
workers democratically make all kinds of decisions in how those
institutions  are run. Indeed, universities don’t even need
administrators or presidents at all. But in the meantime, they should
be elected democratically by faculty, students, staff and the
community through bodies of self-organization like deliberative
assemblies.

The power of workers to shut down production can play a key role in
advancing our struggles forward and as students we should give all our
solidarity to the working class. The 1,200 UAW  workers currently on
strike at Cornell University following the historic UC workers strike
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took place in May and June is one example of the way in which we can
fight back the exploitative nature of the ivory tower. Most of the
workers that are on strike at Cornell are food service workers, cooks,
and custodians – some of the most exploited and precarious workers
at universities. 

As the genocide in Palestine reaches almost a year, the fight against
attacks on our basic democratic rights to free speech and protest are
key to giving a voice to the Pro-Palestine movement here and around
the world. These kinds of attacks cannot be normalized so that we can
continue to organize in our workplaces, schools, and on the streets
for a free Palestine and for an end to a capitalist system that breeds
exploitation and oppression.

_Maryam Alaniz is a socialist journalist, activist, and PhD student
living in NYC. She is an editor for the international section of Left
Voice. Follow her on Twitter: @MaryamAlaniz_

* universities
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* Political repression
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* pro-Palestine protests
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