Speech at Jan. 23 rally, 'Speak-out! On India’s Republic Day Expose the Unholy Alliance of HINDUTVA and ZIONISM'
Thank you all for being here today.
I’m speaking to you today as part of Academics for Palestine, a collective uniting members of the Concordia community—graduate students, faculty, staff, alumni, and organizations—who are committed to justice for Palestine and are active on Concordia campuses through the university’s local and international ties. We advocate for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) as a means to hold Israel accountable for its apartheid regime and systemic oppression of Palestinians. I am here to tell you about what we have been doing in the last 18 months and draw some similarities between Zionism and Hindutva in how they stifle dissent and silence solidarity.
Over the past few months, our community has faced a relentless wave of attacks on Palestine solidarity—attacks not only targeting us but also our allies on campus and in the wider Montreal community. We’ve been organizing petitions, writing letters, hosting events, and holding protests. We’ve been advocating for students and faculty in precarious positions who have been targeted by Zionist organizations and/or by Concordia’s administration. But despite our efforts, the repression has been unrelenting.
Let me give you a few examples of what’s been happening right here at Concordia:
Events are being canceled, often under the false pretext of security risks or accusations of anti-Semitism. This includes BDS motions passed in the spring and summer by student groups and departments in adherence to PACBI. These motions have faced well-financed attacks by organizations like Honest Reporting, whose mandate explicitly aims to conflate criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism. There website defines them as ““an independent grass-roots organization promoting fairness and accuracy in Canadian media coverage of Israel , the Middle East and matters affecting Canada’s Jewish community, and which works to challenge anti-Jewish rhetoric, particularly when antisemitism hides behind a mask of anti-Israel criticism.”
Following this and other complaints about support for the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI), in November, a memo from the Provost required political statements to be taken down from Concordia’s department websites.
Violence on campus has escalated. Protests have been met with police violence, undercover surveillance, and increased security measures. Concordia even hired a security company run by veterans of the Israeli Defense Forces—directly embedding state violence into our campus. Students have faced profiling and violence. (more...)
Expose the Connections Between Zionism and Hindutva
Related:
“Unholy Alliance" Between Zionism and Hindutva
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