KCL Walks Out on the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People

On Wednesday 29 November 2023, hundreds of KCL students and KCL UCU and UNISON members held a walk out and rally to mark the UN International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People. This is an annual event with a long history – recognizing the decades of injustices suffered by Palestinians and of their struggle for self-determination. The events were all the more relevant and poignant this year, given Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza and increasing violence and repression across the territories of historical Palestine. We are proud that our national union UCU is backing this international day of action and the call by Stop the War to organize workplace actions.

We are part of a growing global movement demanding a permanent ceasefire and an end to the occupation. As workers and trade unionists, we have a key role to play in answering the call of Palestinian trade unions to disrupt Israel’s military power that is backed by our government. We walked out today also to respond to the call of Shut it Down for Palestine to keep building momentum and increase the pressure, with marches, walk outs and other forms of direct action. We also joined with our amazing students, who for four consecutive weeks have coordinated walk outs and campus protests to demand a permanent ceasefire in Gaza and an end to universities’ complicity. 

Despite all its emphasis on student wellbeing, King’s management is failing in their duty of care towards Palestinian students and staff, and are trying to marginalise, intimidate or repress pro-Palestinian voices on campus. As Kings academics, professional services, support staff and students, we won’t be silenced, either by our university, research funding bodies or the UK government. We demand that the college rescind links with Israeli universities that work with the military and support practices and technologies of apartheid. Our national union has passed motions on divestment of our pension fund and the HE sector from companies that support violence against Palestinians. Our branch has demanded that these are implemented. We have also passed an extensive motion written by members detailing and reaffirming our commitment to implementing boycott, divestment and sanctions. 

We started our rally today remembering our alumnus Dr Maisara Alrayyes, killed by an Israeli airstrike alongside eight members of his family at the beginning of November. Their bodies are still under the rubble. KCL has not recognized that Maisara was Palestinian and refuses to name and condemn who killed him. They held a memorial for him inside at the same time as the workplace action, but not as part of the UN International Day of Solidarity for the Palestinian People. We (along with others, including students) requested that, if KCL would not join this day of solidarity, it should reschedule the memorial so a wider range of people from our community can participate. KCL refused. How can the leaders of this university honour Maisara’s life without standing in solidarity with Palestine?

KCL UNISON and UNISON members read their letter of condolences to Maisara’s surviving family and friends.

Dr Anas Ismail, Kings alumnus and doctor from Gaza, told us what a big personal and collective loss this has been for the medical community in Gaza, and for Maisara’s family and friends. 

“What we can do and should do is to follow their paths and honour their memories by continuing the work that they were trying to achieve by making Palestine and Palestinians’ lives better and by giving them as much freedom as we can until they have the fuller freedom that they deserve and the full human rights that they deserve like any other people on the planet.” 

A member of Palestine Youth Movement and KCL student said: 

“It has become the case that the student body in all of our universities have had to directly and loudly address and actively protest against our administrations for their insistence on complicity in the genocide of Palestinians in Gaza. We refuse to let them speak for us, and we doubly refuse to allow for business to continue as usual, we will not forget the intimidation, the repression, the silence and the hypocrisy. In this case, and indeed in all cases of colonial struggle worldwide, the student body and our faculty need to be united, and loud. Every single one of us has a voice and that voice is powerful, that voice matters. And when we use that voice to speak out and advocate for the oppressed, collectively we can dismantle this war machine and all of its ties. We will continue to speak out and escalate until all our demands are met, and our message reaches not only them but every corner of the globe.“

Other students shared with us their experiences of repression of pro-Palestinian voices on the part of King’s management. A member of the KCL student union told the rally about the statement issued by three elected VPs challenging the Student Union’s lack of condemnation of the Israeli invasion of Gaza, which contrasts with a previous statement of condemnation of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The three officers faced intimidation on the part of the KCLSU’s Senior Leadership, who threatened them with suspension if they did not take their statement down. They have now backtracked, however the threat of suspension is still there

Also many activists and trade unionists joined us today, including Jewish socialist Sophia Beach, who came to advocate for a free Palestine, from the river Jordan to the Mediterranean Sea, where everyone, Arabs, Jews, Christians and people of all faiths and none can live in peace and equality. We also heard from Cultural Workers against Genocide who also walked out and marched on the South Bank. 

This movement is international. We were delighted that workers from Italy’s SI-COBAS joined us today and told us about the general strike for Palestine that they organized on the 17th of November.

Peppe D’Alesio from the Si-Cobas National Executive Committee said: 

On “November 17th [our union Si Cobas] proclaimed a national strike against the Zionist genocide in Gaza. On that day, hundreds of logistics warehouse workers in the most important national and international supply chains (SDA, BRT, GLS, Fedex, Dhl, UPS and others) went on strike. In Modena, workers blocked the Israel-owned Tekapp factory, which deals with cybersecurity for the Zionist state. In Salerno we picketed the port terminal for several hours, and blocked the transit of containers of the Israeli company ZIM which transports weapons to the port of Ashdod.. … The fight against the occupation is part of a more general fight against the war, the economy of war and the governments of war, starting with our Western governments, accomplices and allies of Israel. … Stop the bombing, stop the occupation, free Palestine! Workers of the world, let’s unite!”

Shabbir Lakha, from Stop the War Coalition concluded the rally by saying:

“Over the last year we have seen the biggest strike wave in a generation. There has been new confidence and militancy that has been instilled in millions of workers across the country. We need to utilise that industrial strength in the fight for Palestinian liberation. There is no separation of the foreign policy and the domestic. The fight to save higher education, the fight for fair pay and conditions goes hand in hand with the fight against imperialism. And that is why today’s walk out is so important. We know that there are millions of people who agree with us. We know that 80 percent of the British public supports a ceasefire. And we need to give them the confidence to take these arguments to organise in their workplaces and in their communities and in their unions.”

 

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