Call for Faculty for Justice in Palestine

USACBI has issued a call to form Faculty for Justice in Palestine (FJP) groups on campuses in order to support NSJP, protect local SJP organizers, offer faculty defense, organize teach-ins and other actions, and engage in Palestine solidarity work generally.

Faculty at several campuses (NYU and Claremont Colleges most recently, and University of Hawai’i, UC Davis, Kent State University, University of Florida, UMass Boston, and Purdue University previously) have launched FJP groups that include faculty, graduate employees, and staff.

In response to the genocidal assault on Gaza, and the crackdown on pro-Palestinian voices, colleagues on other campuses are now in the process of forming FJP groups. There are hopes of forming a national federation in the immediate future.

As advocates for the BDS movement, we ask that founding members make a commitment to the founding principles of USACBI, alongside others.

To help with group formation, we are including the mission statements or principles of unity adopted by some of the existing groups. They may be a useful resource for people who want to do this foundational work on their own campuses.

For more information or advice on starting an FJP at your institution, please email us at fjp@usacbi.org.

Faculty for Justice in Palestine NYU Principles of Unity (under ratification)

  • FJP is a democratic and plural collective of NYU faculty who  support  the cause of Palestinian liberation. We define faculty broadly to refer to those involved in making education available at NYU, including both tenure and non-tenure track faculty, staff, and graduate employees.

  • FJP understands the struggle for Palestinian freedom to be aligned with anti-colonial movements and struggles in many parts of the world. These include movements for indigenous land rights, Black liberation, gender and sexual freedom and a liveable and sustainable planet.

  • FJP supports the call for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions and for an end to Israel’s occupation and colonization of Palestine. We insist on the fundamental rights of Palestinians to self-determination and legal equality, and we pledge to respect, protect and promote the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and lands.

  • FJP rejects the conflation of support for Palestinian liberation and antisemitism; we stand against racism in all its manifestations.

  • FJP supports and amplifies the work of SJP and other pro-Palestinian student groups at NYU.

  • As part of our commitment, FJP members engage in education, advocacy, and action.

  • The most securely employed among us protect more vulnerable members at all times.

  • FJP participates in regional cross-campus coalitions with allies at other universities, and as a branch of an emergent national network.

Faculty & Staff for Justice in Palestine – UMass Boston

As educators and staff at the University of Massachusetts Boston, we stand against all forms of colonialism, racism, and apartheid.  These hierarchical forms of power relations make free inquiry, equal access to all forms of knowledge production, and the collegial exchange of ideas impossible.

The question of Palestine has become a fulcrum of these struggles on university campuses in the U.S., and students and faculty who are part of the Palestine solidarity movement are increasingly subject to surveillance, criminalization, and punishment. Thus, we view the movement for justice in Palestine as a crucial terrain for defending freedom of expression and political commitment within the academy; preserving free inquiry, engaged pedagogy, and open scholarship; and cultivating egalitarian campus governance in the face of attacks by off-campus groups allied with unconditional U.S. support for the Israeli state.

In this context, we support those in Palestine who have called for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS; www.bdsmovement.net) and international solidarity in their struggle to:

  1. End Israel’s occupation and colonization of Palestine and all Arab lands occupied in June 1967 and dismantle the Wall;
  2. Recognize the fundamental rights of the Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality;
  3. Respect, protect and promote the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties as stipulated in UN resolution 194.

As well, we support those in Palestine who have called for academic and cultural boycott of Israel and Israeli educational institutions for their complicity in colonialism and occupation, specifically including:

  • Systematic denial of the Nakba;
  • Substantial academic work supporting weapons development, military strategy, and occupation;
  • Entrenched racial discrimination against and segregation of Palestinian citizens of Israel within primary, secondary, and higher education.

As with BDS, we will uphold the academic and cultural boycott shall until Israeli academic and cultural institutions recognize the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people as enshrined in international law and end their complicity in violating Palestinian rights, again as stipulated in international law (www.pacbi.org).

University of Hawai’i Chapter of Faculty for Justice in Palestine (FJP) Mission Statement

As educators at UHM we stand for universal education and right to education, and therefore against obstructions to this goal, including all forms of colonialism, racism, and apartheid. Within both this broad understanding and from our own particular location on Hawaiian land occupied and colonized by the United States, we constitute ourselves in solidarity with Palestinians resisting occupation, warfare, displacement, and dispossession. FJP welcomes–and is interested in strengthening connections among–faculty, staff, those in adjunct positions, graduate students, and community educators. As we come together, we are interested in principled opposition to the economic and political restructurings associated with global capital that are at work in Palestine and in our own location.

The Palestinian question has become one of the great moral as well as political issues debated on university campuses, and students and teachers who are part of the Palestine solidarity movement are increasingly subject to surveillance, and criminalization. Thus, we view the movement for justice in Palestine as a crucial terrain for highlighting the defense of freedom of expression and political commitment within the academy; the preservation of free inquiry, engaged pedagogy, and open scholarship; and the survival of egalitarian campus governance in the face of attacks by off-campus groups allied with unconditional United States support for the Israeli state.

In this context, we also support those in Palestine who have called for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions and for international solidarity in their struggle to:

  1. End Israel”s occupation and colonization of all Arab lands and dismantle the Wall;
  1. Recognize the fundamental rights of the Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality; and
  1. Respect, protect and promote the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties as stipulated in UN resolution 194.