{"id":127,"date":"2024-02-20T03:50:57","date_gmt":"2024-02-20T03:50:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/deerwoman.press\/?p=127"},"modified":"2024-02-20T07:52:44","modified_gmt":"2024-02-20T07:52:44","slug":"sjp-and-ucup-say-no-business-as-usual-during-genocide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/deerwoman.press\/?p=127","title":{"rendered":"SJP and UCUP say: No Business as Usual During Genocide"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

by SJP Organizer, February 19, 2024, 21:49 \/\/\/<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On February 16, while the University of Chicago conducted a disciplinary hearing against Students for Justice in Palestine at UChicago (SJP) for our \u201cdisruptive\u201d protest tactics, we sent a message to the University Administration loud and clear<\/em>: There will be no business as usual during genocide. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We rallied alongside other students, faculty, staff and community members, using our voices, drums, whistles, horns, cow-bells, and whatever else we had on hand to make so much noise that we were heard for blocks away. We successfully shut down Rosenwald Hall, the University\u2019s admissions building. The building where the administration chose to arrest 26 students and 2 faculty members at a sit-in in November, rather than meeting with us about our urgent demands. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The rally started in the main quad. Protestors gathered with banners and posters saying,  \u201cAll Eyes on Rafah,\u201d \u201cFree Palestine,\u201d \u201cIsraeli Military Off Our Campus,\u201d and \u201cJewish Students for a Free Palestine.\u201d<\/em> We were joined by the president of Saint Xavier University\u2019s SJP and the co-chair of SJP Chicago. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThroughout the history of protests at this institution and beyond, movements create change by disrupting business as usual,\u201d the MC told the crowd. \u201cThey do not create change by keeping quiet\u2014in accordance with amplified sound policies.\u201d The MC reiterated SJP and UChicago United for Palestine (UCUP)\u2019s demands for full financial transparency, full divestment from the weapons manufacturers arming the Israeli genocide, the end of  UChicago\u2019s partnerships with Israeli institutions, including the Israel Institute.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first speaker, an organizer with UCUP, emphasized our moral obligation to disrupt the U.S.-Israeli war machine.The machine is currently targeting Rafah, where 1.5 million displaced civilians have fled, and which Israeli forces repeatedly designated as \u201csafe.\u201d \u201cThe reality is that there are no safe places in Gaza,\u201d the UCUP organizer said, \u201cin the world\u2019s largest open-air prison, Rafah is the execution chamber.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The second UCUP speaker spoke about the first charge leveled at SJP: \u201cdisrupting\u201d the Zionist counter-rally on the Quad on October 19th. Since October 16th, SJP and allied students have tabled in the quad every day in solidarity with Palestine, as the number of Palestinians martyred in Gaza rose by the day. On October 19th,  Zionist groups came to the quad to counter-rally\u2014booking the quad at the last minute to claim official warrant for their encroachment. They shouted at us, \u201cterrorist,\u201d and \u201cbaby-killer,\u201d and called us antisemites, put cameras in our faces in efforts to doxx us, and ripped a megaphone out of a Pro-Palestine student\u2019s hands. \u201cThe University claims that SJP restricted the freedom of speech of the Zionists, once again proving that the University\u2019s neutrality is to side with Zionism and white supremacy,\u201d said the speaker. \u201cThe University completely has looked past Zionist harassment that happens every day on the quad.\u201d The speaker emphasized further the clear contrast between the University\u2019s response to the political situation in Ukraine, and its support of academics there, in comparison to the University\u2019s continued partnerships with Israeli institutions even as all universities in Gaza have been destroyed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Next, the president of Saint Xavier University\u2019s SJP spoke about the broader student movement and repression across campuses: <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cUniversity administrators have attempted to silence any and all forms of pro-Palestinian activism. But this will only make us stronger. We demand our institutions to divest from genocide, we demand an end to U.S. aid to Israeli war crimes, we demand a permanent end to the genocide and massacres that Palestinians have been facing for over 75 years, we demand a cease to the occupation, we demand a cease to apartheid.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Protestors then marched to Levi Hall, the UChicago administration\u2019s building, which we students are barred from entering.  The second charge against SJP is that we disrupted the administration through a blockade in November.  Such disruption was, and continues to be our moral responsibility in the face of our University\u2019s complicity. \u201cLast year, Amnesty International scored UChicago a 0, the lowest score of any institution, based on their human rights practices in their endowment because of their absence of any transparency,\u201d  a UCUP organizer at Levi told protestors. The speaker continued:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe Board of Trustees, a group of millionaires and billionaires who aren\u2019t even at the University, and admin on campus, who refuse again and again to engage with students, tell us nothing about how they operate. And behind closed doors, what are they doing? They are investing in the weapons manufacturers arming genocide, investing in climate destruction, buying up land on the South Side through shell companies, and funding displacement and policing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the words of the co-chair of SJP Chicago, \u201cThis [hearing] is another intimidation tactic that they\u2019ve been doing to every Chicago SJP\u201d. \u201cWe are here to tell them that despite their intimidation tactics, despite their rhetoric of fear, we will continue to show up, they continued.\u201d As the disciplinary hearing proceeded blocks away, we marched around Levi Hall, making so much noise that the Dean on Call informed us we will face \u201cdire consequences\u201d… like not getting a permit next time we want to protest. Good thing we never ask for permits to protest! The Dean on Call told us that if an administrator wanted to take a call right now, they wouldn\u2019t be able to hear it\u2014wouldn\u2019t be able \u201cto conduct business as usual.\u201d That, dear administration, <\/em>is the point. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

From Levi Hall, we marched to Rosenwald, the admissions building, at the height of admissions tours, and we shut it down. UCPD was so scared by the possibility of students entering Rosenwald Hall, a building we have access to, that they decided to close the building for the rest of the day as soon as some of us entered. Student protestors emerged from inside Rosenwald, chanting. \u201cShame on you,\u201d the crowd chanted at the cops, as the cops blocked the entrance to a building which is allegedly supposed to be for the students. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cZionism has always been a settler colonial project, and it has always been dependent on the support of imperialist powers\u2014from Britain to the United States, and from the United States, to our universities,\u201d an organizer with UCUP told the crowd. \u201cWe cannot stop, we will not stop, until Palestine is free from the river to the sea. And we will win. It can be tempting to feel hopeless, against the might of Israel and the United State\u2019s horrific power. But As Mariame Kaba says, hope is a discipline. We create hope, by organizing collectively, even in the face of devastation, of hatred, of harassment, of silencing and repression.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

An organizer with UCUP led the crowd, singing the protest song, \u201cWe\u2019re on the Freedom Side.\u201d  Another organizer read a poem in Arabic, by the poet Hanna Abo Hanna, which concludes \u201cwe must go beyond sympathies and despair, and instead stand in solidarity with and heed the martyrs\u2019 calls to rise up\u201d.  The protest concluded with chants of \u201cpeople power\u201d and \u201cI believe that we will win.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Administrators tell us that our voices can only be heard outside, only with permission, and without amplified sound. They have our answer. We refuse. There will be no business as usual while our university remains complicit in genocide, colonization, and apartheid. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by SJP Organizer, February 19, 2024, 21:49 \/\/\/ On February 16, while the University of Chicago conducted a disciplinary hearing against Students for Justice in Palestine at UChicago (SJP) for our \u201cdisruptive\u201d protest tactics, we sent a message to the University Administration loud and clear: There will be no business as usual during genocide.  We […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[8,6,7],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/deerwoman.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/deerwoman.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/deerwoman.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deerwoman.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deerwoman.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=127"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/deerwoman.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":151,"href":"https:\/\/deerwoman.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127\/revisions\/151"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/deerwoman.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=127"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deerwoman.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=127"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deerwoman.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=127"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}