UCUE Letter to UoE on Israel/Palestine

To: Principal Peter Mathieson
cc: Kim Graham, Colm Harmon, James Saville, Sarah Cunningham-Burley, Sarah Prescott

Sent: 26 October 2023

Dear Peter,

We are writing to convey our deep and urgent concern regarding the evolving situation on UK university campuses, and specifically at the University of Edinburgh, in light of current events in Israel and Palestine.

We deplore the loss of life on all sides, Israeli and Palestinian. At the same time, we want to assert the importance, in the face of these atrocities, of our firm belief that the University should be a site for critical inquiry and reflection on such events. We further believe that the University should support its staff who are facilitating difficult conversations about issues characterised by individual, collective, and generational trauma.

At a moment when Israeli government spokespeople are claiming that ‘there is no humanitarian crisis in Gaza’, while UN experts warn that what is happening there constitutes war crimes and may even be considered genocide, we are concerned that the University is failing to ensure that staff and students can safely voice their criticism of states and their actions, wherever they are, whichever people they claim to represent.

In Bristo Square on Friday 20 October, a student member of the University was arrested during a peaceful protest in support of Palestine. Earlier last week, current and former members of our branch committee, and members of our union, were subjected to harassment for expressing pro-Palestine views on the conflict. We further note that in other HE institutions in the UK over the last weeks, there has been a surge in reports of campus events being cancelled, academics being harassed in the media, surveillance of academics and students, and student societies being shut down.

In the first instance, we are deeply concerned about the silencing of legitimate political positions, including calls for a free Palestine, and by the assertion that any calls for Palestinian rights to territory are implicitly or otherwise supportive of Hamas. This is especially troubling for staff teaching on and researching Israel and Palestine, and for students who are at risk of having their visas revoked for expressing their political views on the conflict. It is similarly disturbing to note that a recent letter from the UK Home Secretary to Police Chief Constables in England and Wales interprets ‘support for Hamas’ in an extremely broad fashion. The letter states, for example, that Police have to decide subjectively whether slogans such as ‘Palestine must be free’ may ‘glorify terrorism’ or be ‘construe[d] as incitement or harassment’. Our expectation is that the University commits to protecting staff and students from excessively broad interpretations of these legal restrictions, which UUK has also outlined in its recent statements. Moreover, in light of the UK Secretary of State for Education’s letter sent to all UK Vice Chancellors on 11 October, we are concerned about how the ‘Prevent duty’ may be used to stifle legitimate discussion, and to threaten academics and students with potentially severe and irrevocably damaging accusations.

In a climate where any criticism of the Israeli government now risks being labelled abusive, antisemitic, or as support for terrorism, we also wish to remind you of our branch’s concerns about the University of Edinburgh’s adoption of the International Holocaust Remembrance Association (IHRA) definition of antisemitism in 2020. As you are aware, the University adopted the IHRA definition without consultation with staff or student groups who would be affected by this. The ‘task and finish’ group set up under the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Committee to discuss problems and concerns relating to the IHRA definition in late 2022 was dissolved in July 2023 without any resolution or subsequent action. UCU Edinburgh stands unequivocally against racism in all its forms, including antisemitism and Islamophobia. We maintain the branch’s view that the IHRA definition obfuscates more than it illuminates with respect to challenging racism in our University.

Finally, we wish to convey our deep dismay regarding emerging concerns around the University’s response to student protests. In recent weeks, we have seen the use of private security firms at on-campus events, allegations of university campus security assaulting peacefully protesting students, and police called to campus in response to a peaceful demonstration. We object to the disproportionate and aggressive handling of legitimate actions taken by student members of the University. In many instances, nonviolent action and protest is one of the few legal avenues students have to voice their political dissent and become advocates for change in the face of injustice. We stand in solidarity with student members of our community and call on the University to reject policing of peaceful student demonstrations and end the increased presence of police on campus.

As university workers, we value the careful and expert analysis and evaluation of contemporary political phenomena, based on historical and sociological evidence and lived experience, to produce constructive contributions to scholarly and public debate. In light of this belief, we also wish to draw attention to the attendant implications for academic freedom, to which the University has repeatedly proclaimed its commitment. Academic freedom entails a collective commitment to shared standards of enquiry. It also requires the recognition of our shared responsibility for maintaining a culture in which sensitive and emotive topics, including those pertaining to colonial violence and materially, socially, and epistemologically oppressive hierarchies, can be adequately addressed and made sense of. We strongly reject the false equivalence between forms of expression that perpetuate hateful stereotypes and ignore contrary evidence, and those that present academic contributions that contest entrenched inequalities, vested interests, established hierarchies and the claims asserted by those in powerful positions. We therefore urge you to recognise both the tensions and contradictions that characterise this conflict, and the need for trauma-informed approaches. We maintain that it requires skill and presence to hold space for these difficult conversations. The university staff who do this work must be supported, and the emotional strain of doing this work recognised.

In addition to the academic freedom of staff and students to research, teach and learn about these events and their historical background, as a branch we take the position, ‘nothing about us, without us’. This is a moment when, as a university community, we must ensure that minorities are able to exercise their freedom of expression. This does not mean an unrestricted right to free speech: we do not countenance hate speech in any form. Rather, we call on the University as a site of critical inquiry and learning to take up the task of facilitating the contestation and deconstruction of received wisdom and forms of injustice, by actively listening to and engaging with the lived experiences of minoritised and marginalised members.

We hope you receive this letter in the spirit it is intended; namely, in the interests of cultivating an institutional culture in which we can hold open space for challenging research, teaching and learning, informed by principles of trauma awareness, while respecting the right of minority groups to be safe, heard, and included.

Yours sincerely,

UCU Edinburgh branch committee

Appendix: We would like to bring to your attention the report recently issued by the British Middle East Studies Association (BRISMES) and the European Legal Support Centre (ELSC). This report outlines compelling evidence of the dangers of the IHRA definition for free speech and academic freedom.