As scholars dedicated to questions of justice and ethics we believe that Yvette Cooper’s recent proscription of Palestine Action represents an attack both on the entire pro-Palestine movement and on fundamental freedoms of expression, association, assembly, and protest. We deplore the repressive consequences that this ban has already had, and are especially concerned about the likely impact of Cooper’s ban on universities across the UK and beyond.
We therefore applaud the growing campaign of collective defiance that aims to overturn the ban. We commend the courageous stand taken by Defend our Juries, and the exemplary recent motion adopted by Derry Council that “supports all those who have protested the ban on Palestine Action, and calls for charges against them to be immediately dropped.”
In alliance with thousands of trade unionists, teachers and students throughout the UK and abroad, we affirm our own solidarity with Palestine Action in their campaign against proscription. We fully share both their aim of ending the flow of weapons from Britain to Israel and their belief that all participants in the pro-Palestine movement should be free to make our own decisions about how best to achieve that goal. We remind the UK government that its own most urgent priorities should already be determined by its binding obligation “to prevent and to punish genocide.”
As the organisers of massive national demonstrations face prosecution, as hundreds of people again risk arrest by joining street protests on 9 August, and as students and teachers prepare for the start of another turbulent academic year, we express our full solidarity with those mobilising on their campuses or in their workplaces and communities to put an immediate stop to the escalating genocide and to end all UK complicity with Israel’s crimes.
(An extended version of this text with a longer list of signatures will be published on the Verso blog).
Signed:
- Gilbert Achcar, Emeritus Professor of Development Studies and International Relations, SOAS, University of London.
- Anne Alexander, Senior Research Associate, Cambridge Digital Humanities, University of Cambridge.
- Tariq Ali, writer and historian.
- Sandra Babcock, Clinical Professor of Law, Cornell University Law School.
- Etienne Balibar, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy, University of Paris X – Nanterre.
- Chetan Bhatt, Anthony Giddens Professor of Social Theory, London School of Economics.
- Wendy Brown, UPS Foundation Chair, School of Social Science, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton.
- Susan Buck-Morss, Distinguished Professor, CUNY Graduate Centre, NYC.
- Judith Butler, Distinguished Professor in the Graduate School, Department of Comparative Literature, UC Berkeley.
- Alex Callinicos, Emeritus Professor of European Studies, King’s College London.
- John Chalcraft, Professor of Middle East History and Politics, London School of Economics.
- Emilios Christodoulidis, Chair of Jurisprudence, University of Glasgow.
- Rebecca Comay, Professor of Philosophy and Comparative Literature, University of Toronto.
- Angela Davis, Distinguished Professor Emerita, UC Santa Cruz.
- Alex de Waal, Executive Director, World Peace Foundation.
- Jodi Dean, Professor of Politics, Hobart and William Smith Colleges, Geneva, NY.
- Elsa Dorlin, Professor of Contemporary Political Philosophy, Université Toulouse Jean Jaurès.
- Jennifer Doyle, Professor of English, UC Riverside.
- Haidar Eid, Associate Professor of Postcolonial Literature, Al-Aqsa University, Gaza, Palestine.
- Roberto Esposito, Professor of Philosophy, Scuola Normale Superiore, Pisa.
- John Bellamy Foster, Professor Emeritus, Sociology, University of Oregon.
- Verónica Gago, Professor of Social Sciences, University of Buenos Aires.
- Neve Gordon, Professor of International Law, Queen Mary University of London.
- Greg Grandin, Peter V. and C. Vann Woodward Professor of History, Yale University.
- Penny Green, Professor of Law and Globalisation, Queen Mary University of London.
- Peter Hallward, Professor of Modern European Philosophy, CRMEP.
- Michael Hardt, Professor of Literature, Duke University.
- Robin D.G. Kelley, Professor of History, UCLA.
- Rashid Khalidi, Edward Said Professor Emeritus of Modern Arab Studies, Columbia University.
- Naomi Klein, UBC Professor of Climate Justice, University of British Columbia.
- Elena Loizidou, Professor in Law and Political Theory, Birkbeck College.
- Frédéric Lordon, Research Director, CNRS, France.
- Tracy McNulty, Professor of Comparative Literature and Romance Studies, Cornell University.
- Angela McRobbie FBA, Professor Emeritus, Goldsmiths University of London.
- Sandro Mezzadra, Professor of Political Theory, University of Bologna.
- China Miéville FRSL, Salvage.
- Abdaljawad Omar, Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Cultural Studies, Birzeit University, Palestine.
- Ilan Pappé, Professor of History and Middle Eastern Studies, Director of the Centre of Palestine Studies, University of Exeter.
- Paul Patton, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, University of New South Wales, Australia.
- Bruce Robbins, Old Dominion Foundation Professor in the Humanities, Columbia University.
- William I. Robinson, Distinguished Professor of Sociology, University of California at Santa Barbara.
- Jacqueline Rose, Professor of Humanities and Co-Director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities, University of London.
- Lynne Segal, Professor Emerita of Psychosocial Studies, Birkbeck, University of London.
- Avi Shlaim FBA, Emeritus Professor of International Relations, St Antony’s College, Oxford.
- Nikhil Pal Singh, Chair, Department of Social and Cultural Analysis, New York University.
- Elettra Stimilli, Professor of Philosophy, Sapienza Università di Roma.
- Rei Terada, Professor Emerita of Comparative Literature, UC Irvine.
- Enzo Traverso, Professor in the Humanities, Cornell University.
- Françoise Vergès, Senior Research Fellow Sarah Parker Remond Centre for the Study of Racism and Racialization, UCL.
- Mara Viveros Vigoya, Professor in the Faculty of Human Sciences at Universidad Nacional de Colombia, and Simón Bolívar Professor, University of Cambridge, 2024-25.
- Eyal Weizman, Founding Director of Forensic Architecture and Professor of Spatial and Visual Cultures, Goldsmiths, University of London.
- Jessica Whyte, Scientia Associate Professor of Philosophy, University of New South Wales, Australia.
To add your name to this letter please click here: http://tinyurl.com/ScholarsPalActionLetter