For R5: “Towards a National Student Strike for Palestine”

The author motivates in favor of Resolution 5 for the 2024 YDSA national convention.

Over the next year, YDSA’s organizing for Palestinian liberation must be bold and lead with a positive vision. If we want to win our demands—the full disclosure and divestment of our colleges from Israel, a ceasefire in Gaza, and complete academic freedom on our campuses—we must organize a nationwide Student Strike for Palestine.

Resolution 5 “Towards a National Student Strike for Palestine” is an ambitious resolution, demanding a lot of hard work. Organizing is hard; winning is harder. As students who live in the belly of the beast, we have the responsibility to demand that our institutions take our tuition money out of Israel. And we don’t win by asking politely. We don’t win by running autonomous actions. We win by organizing together across the nation and leveraging all of our power against our universities, upending the very social fabric of our campuses until our administration has no choice but to listen to our collective voice: disclose, divest, we will not stop, we will not rest.

The Context

Very few people saw the Gaza Solidarity Encampment movement on the horizon in mid-April. And yet, by early May, we saw the largest national student movement of our lifetimes being played out right in front of us. Columbia’s encampment was just the first spark in the movement, and soon, students across the country set up their own encampments to demand the full divestment of their colleges and universities from Israel.

However, along with the protests came the repression. Students across the country faced brutal sweeps by the hands of the police state, and our comrades now face suspension and expulsion for participating in Palestine organizing. Hundreds of students have been arrested, and many face academic discipline. Importantly, repression came from all corners of the United States, from the deepest blue states at UCLA and City University of New York, to the brightest red states at colleges Emory and University of Florida.

And yet, while the Gaza Solidarity Encampment movement was such a beautiful show of organizing energy, we must be honest with ourselves: most encampments did not win. Why is that?

The reasons for this are twofold. First, college administration thinks they can wait us out, and in some cases, they did. They let students either go away for summer break, or they let students’ infighting get the best of us. While we have the power of the masses on our side, college administration has one thing against us—time. They think that we will grow tired, grow weary, and grow apathetic. They are wrong. Second, encampments were strategic because they disrupted the day-to-day life of some students. For us to truly disrupt life at our campuses, we must organize the masses of students into a disruptive action which leverages the people against their administrations.

Why a Strike?

We need disruption—and a strike does just that. When students refuse to go to class, the university cannot function.

A student strike fixes the two problems laid out in the previous section. Firstly, if we are able to organize a critical mass on our campuses to strike, not going to class is easy compared to an encampment. An encampment is a high-stress, high-pressure situation, in which arrest and sweeps feel imminent at all times. A strike, while still high-stress, enables the masses to come and go from pickets and is a more accessible action for a wider range of students who may have thought an encampment was not the appropriate space for them. Secondly, a strike shakes the very foundation of the university to its core. No one can ignore large swathes of empty classrooms. No one can just turn around and plug their ears when the university can no longer call itself a university.

At certain campuses, like my campus at NYU, it was quite easy for students to simply cross the street or take a different route to class if they did not want to see the encampment. When there is a student strike, you cannot ignore it. It is in every single thing you do at the university. It leverages the power we have as students—as the mass of people on our campuses—and weaponizes it against the university. The university might have money and time, but we have the conviction and the numbers.

It is also important that this is a national movement which is coordinated across the United States. Encampments were powerful because it wasn’t just one campus—it was all of us uniting against our universities’ complicity in war crimes and genocide. There are cases to be made for considering “local conditions.” For example, during my time organizing YDSA’s national trans rights and bodily autonomy campaign, it was imperative that we consider local conditions. The demand regarding reproductive justice in a blue state like New York is much different than in a red state like Missouri.

However, this is different. We are talking about a genocide funded by our government. For our National Student Strike for Palestine, we all have the same demands, and we all have the same targets. We are demanding the full disclosure and divestment of our college and universities’ from Israel. If we unite together as a nationally coordinated movement of students, that is so much more powerful than small, local, autonomous actions. The movement is more impactful, more inspiring, more strategic, and more safe when we organize together rather than without each other there to support one another in the struggle for a Free Palestine.

When We Fight, We Win

This is not the time to act meek. This is not the time to be afraid of the military-industrial police state. That is exactly what they want from us. They want us to cower in fear. We cannot give in. We cannot afford to be little. There is no time. The Palestinian people are in the midst of a genocide with over 40,000 people dead (which some sources say is a tragic underestimate), while the US war-machine—our very colleges and universities—fund their killers. YDSA must lead a national, democratically-run Student Strike for Palestine. It is the strategy which leverages what we have—the people—against our college administrations. The fact that it will be a national movement, a cohesive one which is coordinated, will help build momentum and create the largest student action this country has ever seen. 

Vote yes on Resolution 5 “Towards a National Student Strike for Palestine.”