Flagrant Support for Apartheid: Penn State’s Relationship with Israel
Authored by: Penn State Student
This article is part of the SCDS Fall 2023 Penn State Dis-Orientation Guide. View the full Guide here: https://medium.com/@scdsstatecollege/list/penn-state-disorientation-guide-fall-2023-7baaafbc9a79
My grandparents were kicked out of the only home they’d ever known in 1967. My parents grew up without citizenship, separated from their parents, never stepping foot in their homeland. My siblings and I grew up away from our relatives, moving from country to country. As a Palestinian refugee, I have witnessed generation after generation of displacement, separation, and instability in my family.
Palestinians have been suffering under the hands of Israel for 75 years. Since Israel’s establishment as a settler-colonial state in 1948, Palestinians have been enduring ongoing violence, brutality, and displacement. From child imprisonment, to illegal settlements, to unjustified home demolitions, the Nakba, or Catastrophe, was far from a single, time-locked event. In 2021, human rights organizations, including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, affirmed what Palestinians have been saying for decades — Israel is practicing apartheid, or institutionalized and systematic racism, to maintain its settler colonial regime.
Israel is only able to maintain this regime because of the support it receives from governments and corporations. Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) is a Palestinian-led movement which urges people of conscience, corporations, and governments to place political and economic pressure on Israel employing social justice tactics utilized in the anti-South African Apartheid struggle. It demands that Israel 1) end Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestinian land since 1967, 2) recognize the fundamental rights of Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality, and 3) respect the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes as stipulated in UN Resolution 194.
The demands of BDS constitute the most basic standards of solidarity with Palestinians — standards that Penn State has yet to uphold. Penn State’s involvement with Israel is extensive and long-standing. From study abroad, to relationships with arms manufacturers, to censorship of speech on Palestine, Penn State actively supports the oppression of Palestinians and maintenance of the Israeli settler colonial regime.
Below are just a few of the ways:
1. Trips and Study Abroad to Israel
a. Birthright
By supporting Penn State Hillel’s Birthright Israel, (1) the university turns a blind eye to the erasure of Palestinian history and identity. Penn State Hillel describes Birthright as:
“a FREE Birthright Israel trip with Penn State… what sets our trips apart is that we are able to experience Israel as a Penn State Community!”
Birthright Israel, a program sponsored by the government of Israel and private donors, aims to strengthen Jewish support and connections with Israel through a fully-funded trip to Israel. Birthright Israel pushes forth the Zionist mission, twisting the political reality by rewriting history, hiding Israeli occupation and apartheid, and manipulating Jewish history and identity into support for an apartheid state. As millions of Palestinian refugees continue to be denied return to their homeland — a right protected under international law, and one of the many examples of Israeli violations of international law — an individual of Jewish descent may visit Israel on a free trip.
b. Study Abroad and trips
In addition to supporting Birthright Israel, Penn State violates Palestinian demands to boycott Israeli academic institutions by sponsoring study abroad trips to Tel Aviv University, University of Haifa, and Technion University in Haifa, as well as other trips including the Tel Akko Total Archeology Project (2) and US and Israel Embedded Entrepreneurial Leadership Course. (3) Israeli institutions are complicit in Israeli apartheid, occupation, and violations of international human rights law. Palestinian demands call for “non-cooperation in the scientific and technical fields between Palestinian and Israeli universities.” By supporting or participating in these study abroad programs, Penn State is perpetuating the ongoing violation of the academic and human freedoms of Palestinians.
2. Research
a. Receiving US-Israel grant money
In 1972, the U.S. and Israeli government established the United States-Israel Binational Science Foundation (BSF), a grant-awarding institution which has two main goals: 1) strengthening the U.S.-Israel partnership through science, and 2) promoting research for the benefit of the two countries. Institutions in Pennsylvania have received 5.8 million in BSF grants, (4) among which is Penn State. Additionally, Penn State is involved in projects with the United States-Israel Binational Agricultural Research and Development Fund (BARD), further entrenching the university’s research relationships with Israel.
3. Relationships with Arms Manufacturers
Every year, U.S. war profiteers fuel violence at home and abroad, manufacturing billions of dollars worth of weapons to arm violent regimes from Israel to police departments across the U.S. Penn State’s advancement of militarism is far from new (see Penn State and the War Machine). Currently, Penn State performs research with several of these companies, including, but not limited to, Boeing and Raytheon. Penn State’s Applied Research Laboratory conducts the Gear Research Institute, (5) sponsored by Boeing, Rolls Royce, and other companies invested in militarism. In addition to these critical research relationships, Penn State’s World Campus is in a partnership with Raytheon, (6) the world’s second largest weapons manufacturer.
4. Censorship
In addition to complicity in and active support for Israel’s apartheid regime, Penn State administration has censored support for Palestine on campus. Following an uptick of Israeli violence in 2021, more than 300 academic departments, program centers, unions and societies worldwide endorsed statements supporting Palestinian rights. (7) The African American Studies department at Penn State was one of these institutions, publishing a statement in solidarity with Palestine, denouncing settler-colonialism and apartheid amid a spectacle of racialized and gendered violence. (8) The statement was taken down after inquiries from the dean. The department later reissued it, noting that the statement “has been subject to a different level of administrative scrutiny, unprecedented for our department.”
Penn State’s student body has not been silent about their support for Palestine. Earlier this year, students held a protest (9) against 75 years of Israeli settler-colonialism — but the history of student resistance does not start there. From protests held by the Organization of Arab Students and the Penn State Association for Palestine in the 1980s to the walk-outs staged by Penn State Students for Justice in Palestine chapter in the early 2010s, students who support freedom, justice, and equality for Palestinians have resisted Penn State’s complicity for decades.
As a Palestinian, it is my responsibility to continue my people’s history of steadfast resistance. As a Penn State student, it is my responsibility — our responsibility — to end Penn State’s complicity in Israel’s oppression of Palestinians. By engaging in BDS, and pressuring the university to do the same, we can stand in solidarity with Palestinians as they resist their daily oppression. It is on us to ensure that our university does not continue to provide rampant support for a settler-colonial apartheid state.
- Penn State Hillel, “Birthright Israel,” https://pennstatehillel.org/birthright/
- Penn State Jewish Studies Program, “Study Abroad,” https://jewishstudies.la.psu.edu/opportunities/study-abroad/
- Penn State Hillel, “US and Israel Embedded Entrepreneurial Leadership Course,” https://www.facebook.com/PennStateHillel/photos/engr-310-e-ship-in-israel-tripinterest-meeting-oct-3-at-615pm-in-006-armsby-piz/955161124635522/
- Jewish Virtual Library, “State-to-State Cooperation: Pennsylvania and Israel,” https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/pennsylvania-israel-cooperation#grants
- Penn State Applied Research Laboratory, “Gear Research Institute,” https://www.arl.psu.edu/gri/
- Penn State World Campus, “Benefits of the Raytheon Technologies Education Alliance with Penn State World Campus,” https://www.worldcampus.psu.edu/b2b/rtx/overview
- Palestine Legal, “Palestine Protests: Palestine Is Still an Exception — Especially at Universities,” https://palestinelegal.org/news/2021/7/29/palestine-protests-palestinestill-an-exception-especially-at-universities
- Insider Higher Ed, “‘An Unprecedented Wave’ of Palestinian Solidarity Statements,” https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2021/06/02/academic-statements-expresssolidarity-palestinians-and-condemn-israeli-actions
- Daily Collegian, “Penn State students and community members rally for ’75 years of Nakba, 75 years of resistance,’” https://www.psucollegian.com/news/borough/pennstate-students-and-community-members-rally-for-75-years-of-nakba-75-years-of/article_78245dba-f3ef-11ed-8999-b7835f024e79.html
