Students occupy the Collegium Broscianum area of the Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland, during a pro-Palestine protest on May 24, 2024. (Photo by Akademia)
Warsaw, May 27-- University students in Poland have joined the global anti-Israeli protests, occupying the country’s top university campuses. Media reports said over the weekend that pro-Palestinian students and alumni were occupying 12 universities in Poland.
Protesters demand an end to the Israeli regime's months-long genocidal war on Palestinians trapped in the besieged Gaza Strip. The student protesters wrote open letters to university authorities, demanding that the schools immediately “boycott Israeli institutions at the national and international level until the occupation of Palestine ends, recognize the right of Palestinians to equality and self-determination, and recognize the right of return for Palestinian refugees.”
After university authorities showed no response, on Friday evening the student protesters set up encampments at the campuses of the University of Warsaw — the country’s largest academic institution — and of the Jagiellonian University — the oldest and most prestigious academy in the country.
Israeli regime forces launched a brutal genocide against the defenseless people of Gaza, the majority of which are women and children, following Palestinian resistance groups' retaliatory operation against the Zionists on October 7.
“We’ve been protesting since October against the genocide that is occurring in Gaza, and now we’re sort of bringing it closer,” said philosophy student Nena, one of the protesting pro-Palestinian students at the University of Warsaw. “We have a more direct impact on the institutions we are part of.”
Protesting students at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow made similar demands as those in Warsaw, pledging that they “will not be indifferent, will not be silent, will not be passive.”
They also called on others to join the global pro-Palestinian movement.
Gabriela, an international relations student at the Jagiellonian University told media, “It’s important for me to be here ... to show solidarity with other encampments around the world, so that authorities can’t ignore our demands any longer.”
In recent weeks, the student protests which began at Columbia University in New York City, have spread to university campuses all across the globe. University students worldwide are demanding that the Israelis stop killing Palestinians with impunity, and halt their decades-long atrocities in the occupied lands.
Their other main demands include a permanent ceasefire in Gaza, an end to US military assistance to the apartheid regime, and university divestment from companies profiting from the brutal aggression.
Since the Gaza onslaught was launched in October, the Tel Aviv regime has killed nearly 36,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and injured over 80,000 more.
