Authoritative Palestinian academic bodies are calling on states, academic institutions, multilateral research bodies and international academics not to recognize Ariel University and to refrain from any institutional relations with it.
Ariel University is an illegal institution, and is deeply and directly complicit in Israel’s system of oppression that has denied Palestinians their basic rights guaranteed by international law, including the right to education and academic freedom.
Complicity in international law violations
Ariel University is the most prominent of several Israeli institutions of higher education built in illegal Israeli colony-settlements on Palestinian land in the West Bank.
The West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip were occupied by Israel in 1967 and are internationally considered as Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT), in breach of the Fourth Geneva Convention. The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court considers such settlement of occupied territory a war crime.
United Nations Security Council Resolution 2334 reconfirmed in 2016 that Israel’s settlement activity “has no legal validity and constitutes a flagrant violation under international law.”
Moreover, Ariel University is deeply and directly complicit in Israel’s system of oppression that denies Palestinians their basic rights guaranteed by international law.
Obligations for institutions
Respecting international law, as a peaceful and universal means of conflict resolution, requires denying recognition to, and severing institutional relations with Ariel University as an illegal settlement institution.
Support for non-recognition of Ariel University
The original decision to upgrade Ariel college to a university was opposed by the Council of Presidents of Israeli Universities and by over 1,000 Israeli academics on the grounds that “involving Israeli academia in the ideology of conquest … threatens the ability of the Israeli academia to function.”
In August 2018, the European Association of Social Anthropologists (EASA) voted overwhelmingly (164-0, with 17 abstentions) to support the Israeli Anthropological Association in its refusal to cooperate with the illegal institutions of higher education (located in Israel’s illegal settlements in the OPT) and to “pledge its own non-cooperation with these institutions.”
Who launched the call?
- Palestinian Ministry of Education
- Council of Palestinian Universities’ Presidents
- Palestinian Federation of Unions of University Professors and Employees (PFUUPE)
- Palestinian Human Rights Organizations Council (PHROC)
What you can do:
Urge international institutions and governments to avoid being complicit in illegality, by:
(1) Refraining from accrediting or recognising any diplomas or qualifications conferred by Ariel University;
(2) Conditioning agreements with the Israeli Council for Higher Education on non-recognition and non-accreditation of Ariel University.
International academics are called upon to:
(3) Decline to write or referee for journals published by Ariel or based in it;
(4) Refuse to participate in projects or attend conferences fully or partially sponsored by Ariel University or which include its representatives (dean, head of department or spokesperson) as participants;
(5) Urge universities, conferences and workshops not to host individual academics from Ariel University unless their affiliation is properly indicated as “Ariel University, illegal Israeli settlement of Ariel, Occupied Palestinian Territory” in conference material;
(6) Urge academic journals not to publish material identified with Ariel University unless it is properly indicated as “Ariel University, illegal Israeli settlement of Ariel, Occupied Palestinian Territory;”
(7) Advocate for academic societies to approve motions supporting the call from Palestinian academic bodies not to recognise/sever existing links with Ariel University;
(8) Reject any collaboration with Ariel University as an institution or with any of its bodies.
No Academic Business As Usual with Ariel University 