While students are mobilizing at Sciences Po Paris, Rennes, Menton, Lyon and Saint-Étienne, some of them are calling for the suspension of academic or economic partnerships between their university and Israeli establishments and companies.
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Demonstrations at Sciences Po Paris, Rennes, Menton, Lyon at the Sorbonne and the University of Saint-Étienne, Strasbourg. The mobilization of pro-Palestine students continues and among their demands, a ceasefire in Gaza, the lifting of sanctions against the mobilized students and even the“stopping or suspension of academic or economic partnerships between French faculties and Israeli universities or companies complicit in the genocide or colonization of Palestine”. But what partnerships are we talking about exactly?
In fact, these are mainly academic exchanges between students. Sciences Po has partnerships with four Israeli universities in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Beersheba. Around thirty French students were sent there for a year of exchange or an internship while around sixty Israeli students registered at Sciences Po for a semester or a year, among others. The pro-Palestinian demonstrators are therefore demanding an end to this cooperation.
“There is a question of ethics first of all for Sciences Po. The university also has a political voice and has the capacity to put pressure, through these partnerships, on the Israeli government to force it to stop this genocide.”
Tristan Konigsberg, general secretary of the Student Unionat franceinfo
Out of the question answers the management of Sciences Po which invites the students to a meeting on Thursday May 2. “This was not put on the agenda of the decision-making board of directors on the matter”indicates for its part the presidency of the Sorbonne which is a partner of three Israeli universities.
At Sciences Po Rennes, which is part of the University of Rennes, it is the partnership with the multinational Thalès which is denounced. “This company is a co-shareholder of an Israeli company which produces useful drones on numerous occasions to bomb the Gazan territories. We denounce this partnership in the sense that this company actively participates in the genocide. We are now calling for an end to the partnership with Thales”explains Camille, Master 2 student. At Sciences Po Rennes, the students who blocked the premises were evacuated Tuesday evening by the CRS.
