Birzeit --The Gaza Students Campaign, an international coalition of students and academics from 117 universities, delivered petitions to Israeli embassies in at least seven world capitals on Monday, March 3. The petition calls upon the Netanyahu government to reverse its policy of collective restrictions upon Palestinian education. The petition urges Israel to recognize the importance of education to the peace process and to guarantee academic freedom for the students, teachers, and staff of Gaza who work in the West Bank.
Palestinian students at universities and colleges in the West Bank and Gaza have participated in the campaign, circulating petitions which they submitted directly to Israeli prime minister Netanyahu on 3 March. Israeli and Palestinian human rights groups also worked on the campaign. B'Tselem, an Israeli human rights organisation, coordinated and placed a full-page advertisement in the leading Israeli daily "Ha'aretz" containing the signatures of over one hundred Israeli academics who support the rights of Gaza students.
"This petition is from students to students and from academics to academics," said Nick Guyatt, a graduate student at Cambridge University in England and the international co-ordinator for the petition. "It is an expression of the universal belief in the importance of academic freedom."
The current travel restrictions, which affect over 1300 Gazan students, academics, and staff, were most recently imposed when Israel closed the Occupied Palestinian Territories following the bus bombings of February 1996. Collective restrictions on Gaza students were first imposed in 1993. From then until now it has become more and more difficult for students from Gaza to continue their studies in the West Bank. These restrictions are collective and offer no right of appeal. They violate the provisions of the Israel-PLO Interim Agreement guaranteeing safe passage between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.
Petition organizers have collected signatures on almost fifty college campuses around the world as well as on the internet. The presentation of petition signatures to Israeli embassies by students will take place in Washington D.C., London, Bonn, Paris, The Hague, Ottawa and Wellington. In some cases, a parallel professors' statement, with signatures from hundreds of academics, will also be presented.
The text of the petition read as follows:
"We, the undersigned, call upon Prime Minister Netanyahu and the Government of Israel to guarantee academic freedom for the students, teachers and staff of Gaza who work in the West Bank. We call for Israel to introduce academic permits and a standardised, open system of procedures for dealing with applications. We believe that Palestinian education is of great importance to the peace process, and call upon Israel to ensure that this education is not denied."
For more information check the Academic Freedom First--International Campaign for Gaza Students Homepage.
BZU HRAP Press Release #1/97
For more information contact the Human Rights Action Project, hrap@admin.birzeit.edu.
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