Top UN human rights officials are expressing alarm over the recent wave of violent repression by university administrators against the student protests for Palestinian liberation that have swept the U.S., raising concerns that protesters’ rights to free speech and assembly are being violated.
A statement on Tuesday said that UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk, the UN’s top human rights officer, is “troubled” over a “series of heavy-handed steps taken to disperse and dismantle protests” across U.S. college campuses.
“Freedom of expression and the right to peaceful assembly are fundamental to society — particularly when there is sharp disagreement on major issues, as there are in relation to the conflict in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and Israel,” said Türk. “I am concerned that some of the law enforcement actions across a series of universities appear disproportionate in their impacts.”
Indeed, over the last two weeks, over 1,200 protesters have been arrested across dozens of campuses after university administrators enlisted police to crack down on encampments and other demonstrations set up by students calling for their schools to divest from Israel and supporting corporations, among other demands. At some universities, administrators even allowed law enforcement officers to aim sniper rifles at their students for their peaceful acts of protest.
UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders Mary Lawlor said that universities’ crackdowns are an obvious violation of students’ rights.
“I’m hearing disturbing reports that students face suspension if they don’t end their peaceful protests in Columbia University in the U.S.A. This is a clear violation of their right to peaceful assembly,” Lawlor said.
Türk called for measures taken by universities and police departments to restrict students’ speech to be “carefully scrutinized.” He pushed back against the claims being peddled by many large news outlets and university officials that students are antisemitic for calling for an end to Israel’s occupation of Palestine and genocide in Gaza, which has killed over 34,000 Palestinians over the course of just six months.
“Here, as elsewhere, responses by universities and law enforcement need to be guided by human rights law, allowing vibrant debate and protecting safe spaces for all,” Türk continued. “It must be clear that legitimate exercises of the freedom of expression cannot be conflated with incitement to violence and hatred.”
Advocates for Palestinian rights have said that the widespread repression of the protests demonstrates institutional complicity in the genocide of Gaza, with leaders in higher education willing to use violence against their own students — the very people universities are supposed to foster and protect.
Student protests, which have spread across over 120 campuses in the U.S. so far, have drawn the support of advocacy groups. On Tuesday, a group of nearly 190 groups released a statement stating their support for the students, lauding them as they “risk everything” to defy the U.S.’s backing of Israel’s genocidal regime.
“We commend the students who are exercising their right to protest peacefully despite an overwhelming atmosphere of pressure, intimidation and retaliation, to raise awareness about Israel’s assault on Gaza — with U.S. weapons and funding,” the statement said. It was signed by organizations like Council on American-Islamic Relations Action, Jewish Voice for Peace, Veterans for Peace, and many other Muslim, Palestinian and social justice groups.
“These students have come forth with clear demands that their universities divest from corporations profiting from Israeli occupation, and demanding safe environments for Palestinians across their campuses,” the groups wrote. “We join them in calling for an immediate and lasting ceasefire and an end to the U.S. government’s and institutions’ role in the ongoing genocide of Palestinians in Gaza.”
We’re not backing down in the face of Trump’s threats.
As Donald Trump is inaugurated a second time, independent media organizations are faced with urgent mandates: Tell the truth more loudly than ever before. Do that work even as our standard modes of distribution (such as social media platforms) are being manipulated and curtailed by forces of fascist repression and ruthless capitalism. Do that work even as journalism and journalists face targeted attacks, including from the government itself. And do that work in community, never forgetting that we’re not shouting into a faceless void – we’re reaching out to real people amid a life-threatening political climate.
Our task is formidable, and it requires us to ground ourselves in our principles, remind ourselves of our utility, dig in and commit.
As a dizzying number of corporate news organizations – either through need or greed – rush to implement new ways to further monetize their content, and others acquiesce to Trump’s wishes, now is a time for movement media-makers to double down on community-first models.
At Truthout, we are reaffirming our commitments on this front: We won’t run ads or have a paywall because we believe that everyone should have access to information, and that access should exist without barriers and free of distractions from craven corporate interests. We recognize the implications for democracy when information-seekers click a link only to find the article trapped behind a paywall or buried on a page with dozens of invasive ads. The laws of capitalism dictate an unending increase in monetization, and much of the media simply follows those laws. Truthout and many of our peers are dedicating ourselves to following other paths – a commitment which feels vital in a moment when corporations are evermore overtly embedded in government.
Over 80 percent of Truthout‘s funding comes from small individual donations from our community of readers, and the remaining 20 percent comes from a handful of social justice-oriented foundations. Over a third of our total budget is supported by recurring monthly donors, many of whom give because they want to help us keep Truthout barrier-free for everyone.
You can help by giving today. Whether you can make a small monthly donation or a larger gift, Truthout only works with your support.