The Australia Palestine Advocacy Network (APAN) expresses deep concern at the University of Melbourne’s decision to expel two students and suspend two others for their participation in a protest in October 2024.
The protest drew attention to the university’s ongoing ties with Israeli institutions complicit in Israel’s genocide in Gaza, and its illegal occupation and apartheid across Palestine, and particularly the role of universities in this ongoing violence.
The university’s heavy-handed response is disproportionate and punitive, and further risks the right of students, staff and university community members to protest on campus, a right that is essential to both academic freedom and civic conscience.
APAN is also concerned that the university has failed to meaningfully engage with the students’ core demand that it sever its ties with Israeli institutions that are involved in ongoing violations of international law.
These demands have solid legal backing in the International Court of Justice’s order of January 2024, which found it plausible that Israel is committing genocide, and the court’s advisory opinion of July 2024, which reaffirmed the illegality of Israeli settlements and found that the state had breached international laws prohibiting racial segregation and apartheid.
These rulings have reinforced Australian universities’ legal obligations to ensure they are not complicit in serious human rights violations.
Failing to review their affiliations with Israeli institutions raises serious ethical and legal concerns for Australian universities, as students continue to rightly point out.
APAN urges the University of Melbourne to reconsider these expulsions and suspensions, to commit itself to freedom of expression, protest and justice – for its students and staff, and for Palestinians – and to urgently review and suspend ties with Israeli institutions complicit in genocide, illegal occupation and apartheid.
Comments attributed to APAN President Nasser Mashni:
“The University of Melbourne’s decision to impose the most severe disciplinary measures available to these students sends a dangerous message: that protesting against university complicity in Israel’s genocide, illegal occupation and apartheid, can come with life-altering negative consequences.
“This move undermines students’ right to dissent, and fails to engage in any way with the serious ethical and legal concerns they sought to raise.
“The university must seize this moment to affirm its commitment to justice, freedom of expression and students’ right to protest, and it must immediately take principled action to distance itself from Israeli institutions complicit in genocide.
“Students and staff at this university and all universities must not let the response of their institutions stop them. On the contrary, this response makes clear what the moment demands of all of us: to act collectively in solidarity with each other, with Gaza and with Palestine.”