Tuesday, August 12, 2014

Israel's destruction of the Islamic University of Gaza - eyewitness photos

Dear friends, 
these photos are taken by my dear friend Dr Mosheer Aamer, who teaches linguistics at the Islamic University in Gaza.  The photos are of the destruction of his office and the humanities faculty at the university.

Writing about the photographs, Mosheer explained:
My University office, or what remains of it, as a result of an Israeli F16 missile that hit the University's Administration building; the Faculty of Arts area was completely obliterated. This savagery must stop.
When I spoke to him about the photos, he told me that as horrible as the photos are, "seeing things on the ground this morning was even more horrendous; you just wonder what on earth would make them target an Arts Faculty that is home to languages, journalism and history departments?"

As I have noted on previous post, Israel regularly targets Palestinian academic institutions. Prior to carry out its assault on Gaza, Israel carried out three weeks of illegal collective punishment of the Palestinian residents of the Occupied West Bank. This included carrying out sweeping attacks on Palestinian educational facilities and the right of Palestinians to education.  Israel repeatedly raided Palestinian universities, including Birzeit University near Ramallah and the Arab American University in Jenin. In Bethlehem, Israeli Occupation Forces used the main plaza of Ahliya University as a holding ground for blindfolded Palestinian who had been arrested during raids on Dheisha refugee camp, while at Al Quds University, Occupation Forces open fire with teargas and raided the offices.

While the University Presidents of many American universities were outspoken against the adoption of support for the Palestinian BDS campaign by the American Studies Association, they have been silent about Israel's attacks on the right of Palestinian students to education.  Similarly, the Australian Abbott government and a variety of university chancellors have preferred to turn a blind eye to Israel's repeated undermining of the Palestinian right to education and have opposed the Palestinian BDS campaign.


To see my earlier post on the West Bank raids, click here.
 
Israel's deliberate targeting of Palestinian academic institutions in both the Occupied West Bank and in Gaza, demonstrates once again the importance of supporting the Palestinian BDS campaign, in particular the academic and cultural boycott of Israel.


Mosheer has recently joined twitter and you can follow him: @MosheerAamer

In solidarity, Kim


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