An exhibition organized by the Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign has helped to strengthen the engagement of students at Birzeit University in the resistance against the Occupation.
***image2***The exhibition, showing pictures of Palestinian suffering and struggle, ran from June 2nd to June 7th. It was the first of its kind at the university based close to Ramallah. The images displayed included pictures of the Wall in different areas of Palestine, terminals and tunnels, water resources and land isolated by the Wall.
The Campaign, and the volunteers from the university who had helped to organize the exhibition, were pleased to see large numbers of students attending over the five days. The students were moved by the impact of the images bringing the manifold aspects of the Wall and the Occupation all together in one room. They requested that the campaign run the exhibition monthly with new picture and expressed a desire to see more exhibitions in their villages and town, so friends and family could share the experience.
A programme of presentations and workshops ran alongside the exhibition and continues after its closure. On June 3rd the Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign gave a presentation to 45 students on the Wall, and on June 9th it presented on the growing local and international movements for a Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions. On June10th a representative from the Academic Boycott group gave a talk to the students about the boycott of Israeli academia, which Birzeit University has signed up to.
This week of mobilization and seminars has further strengthened the students resolve to take their active part in the struggle against the Israeli occupation and ghettoization. Many students have vowed to participate in the regular demonstrations against the Wall and the Occupation. Others are planning for more in depth work on the boycott of Israeli products within the West Bank. An active students network to disseminate information about the Apartheid Wall and the boycott movement within Palestine and internationally is to be developed to reactivate this form of resistance within the Palestinian universities and society.
For nine months, the Campaign has been running initiatives in all Palestinian universities. They have included workshops on the Wall as a project of ghettoization, on the Zionist movement and the ideology behind the construction of the Wall. Throughout these workshops, the Campaign has been building networks with and between Palestinian students in different universities and helping them to communicate with each other and share information.