Oxford’s Gaza solidarity encampment: ‘We have reached unprecedented levels of support’
Gaza solidarity encampment in front of Oxford University Museum of Natural History
Michael Arria reports in Mondoweiss on 21 May 2024:
In recent weeks, Gaza solidarity encampments have spread across Britain, inspired by the wave of student organizing in the United States. Earlier this month hundreds of Oxford University students established a “Liberated Zone” at the campus, expressing solidarity with Gaza and calling for the school to divest from Israel.
Mondoweiss spoke with Amytess Girgis, a PhD student at Oxford and an organizer with the group Oxford Action for Palestine, about the encampment, the student demands, and how these protests compare to the U.S. activism.
Mondoweiss: What inspired the encampment?
I’m an American PhD student here at Oxford and it’s been very interesting talking to U.S. universities, coordinating with U.S. universities, and thinking about how to make our actions in the UK as effective as possible. We put our encampment up here at Oxford at the same time as Cambridge, on May 6th. The momentum is tremendous and the coalition that we built at this university is absolutely unprecedented.
We’re also facing repression, but the difference between here and the U.S. is that that U.S. repression is far more visible, the violence is far more visible. Here, especially at places like Oxford which are such unchanging institutions for centuries, the way that they are trying to to battle us is much different. So far that’s largely meant doing strategic gymnastics to avoid us.
What did Palestine activism look like on campus before the encampment?
There’s a tremendously strong community for Palestine activism in the UK. I would say it’s among the strongest in the West and that is very much true of us too. Long before October and there were multiple societies here on campus that have been consistently organizing for Palestine. However, there had not yet been a concerted divestment campaign in this way until October.
In the past seven months we have reached unprecedented levels of support for Palestine on this campus, but that support had been there for a long time. There’s quite a few professors on campus who have been part of that organizing for a long time and there’s continuity from the unions on campus and that’s certainly helped. Then you have London being far and away the largest Palestine activism hub in in Europe has been a huge asset as well. We have people going back and forth to London all the time for events, for rallies, to chat and work with organizers.