Radboud University board wants to break ties with Israeli universities

The Executive Board of Radboud University wants to suspend cooperation with two Israeli universities. This is reported by Nijmegen University Monday On her website. Individual academics can decide for themselves whether they collaborate with Israeli colleagues.

Radboud University has been struggling for more than a year with the consequences of the situation in Gaza for education in Nijmegen. Pro-Palestinian demonstrators built a tent camp, organized protest marches and occupied university buildings. The activists want the ties with Israeli universities to be broken.

The board bases the intention on an analysis of an advisory committee on the human rights situation in Israel and Palestine. Early this month the committee ruled That the Hebrew University from Jerusalem and the Tel Aviv University « directly and specifically » contribute to (some) « serious and systematic human rights violations » by Israel, both in Gaza and in the occupied Palestinian territories.

The advice, for example, states that Israeli students combine a Bachelor Middle Eastern studies with military training. The military students would be ‘prepared’ to work for information services of the Israeli army (IDF). ‘Excellent students’ are also trained as experts in military technology, the committee said. As a result, the Israeli universities may violate scientific integrity, the advisers think.

Military operations

The committee of inquiry advises the Commission to freeze the ‘memorandum of agreement’ (a men’s agreement) and to request the Hebrew University, among other things, to terminate cooperation with the IDF in exclusive military training courses. The Radboud University must also find out whether the Israeli universities do not acquire knowledge and develop equipment for military operations in Gaza and on the occupied West Bank, the Commission advises.

The Executive Board writes that the Participation Council, the University Joint Meeting (UGV), will issue an advice, after which the board will probably take a final decision later this week.

Last Wednesday Tilburg University decided to « at the institutional level » tires suspend With the Israeli universities Bar-Ilan and Reichman. The collaboration with the Hebrew University of Jerusalem remained intact.

To share

Mail the editors