On the 1st of March 2017, the Student Council of the University of Torino approved with a clear majority (76%), a motion supporting the academic boycott of Israel, asking for….
On the 1st of March 2017, the Student Council of the University of Torino approved with a clear majority (76%), a motion supporting the academic boycott of Israel, asking for the withdrawal of the agreements between the Turin University and the Israel Institute of Technology (#Technion) in Haifa. For the first time, an Italian academic institution has endorsed the BDS movement as a nonviolent method aimed at putting an end to the continuous and systematic denial of the rights of the Palestinians by the State of Israel.
The decision of the Student Council is part of an ongoing campaign launched in 2016 by several Italian universities in response to a call by professors and researchers – 351 up to date – to end the collaborations between Italian universities and the Technion, a research institution directly involved in the Israeli military-industrial complex by its collaboration.The target of this campaign is the Technion because the Institute is involved more than any other university in the Israeli military-industrial complex. The institute contributes to the Israel’s regime of occupation, colonialism and apartheid in Palestine. The Technion collaborates with the Israeli army and the main weapons manufacturing companies in Israel, like the Elbit Systems and the Rafael Advanced Defense. Companies that produced different weapons used against civilians, as the drones fired on civilians in Lebanon in 2006 and in Gaza in 2008-2009, or the surveillance equipment for Israel’s Apartheid Wall that transforms what remains of palestinian territory in an open-air prison. The collaboration with the Israeli military and weapons industry makes the Technion an institution directly accomplice in the israeli violations of international law.
The position of the Student Council of the University of Turin, endorsed at an academic level, can be considered a bold statement asking for the end of any collaboration with the Israeli institutions which contribute to or benefit from the violations of international law perpetrated by the State of Israel and which are linked to its armed forces. The students of the University of Turin refuse every collaborations with the israeli regime.
Progetto Palestina
Studenti contro il Technion
– Torino, il Consiglio degli studenti: “L’Università revochi gli accordi col Technion israeliano”