As Israel has murdered more than 30,000 innocent of our innocent people in Gaza in its ongoing genocidal war, we are calling on the University of Liverpool to urgently cut ties with five companies deeply complicit in Israeli crimes committed against Palestinians, which have been widely documented and condemned by the UN and many humanitarian organizations worldwide.
1- Jaguar Land Rover: provides vehicles that the Israeli army uses in its genocide in Gaza, like the Land Rover Defender, which is the most operational patrol vehicle in the Israeli military.
2- BAE Systems: a military contractor that manufactures the weapons used in Israel’s war crimes against Palestinians.
3- Agusta Westland: aids in manufacturing Apache helicopters that are used to kill the innocent people of Gaza, with at least 13 documented children killed by Israeli Apache helicopters in Israel’s 2014 attack on Gaza alone.
4- HP: provides the Israeli army with hardware, as well as software that forms the backbone of Israel’s apartheid practices.
5- Amazon: provides software that enable Israel’s apartheid practices.
These acts of boycott and divestment fall within the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement, which is a Palestinian-led non-violent human rights movement, inspired by the South African anti-apartheid movement. BDS has three clear and simple goals: ending illegal Israeli occupation of all Arab lands (as defined by the UN), granting full equal rights to the Arab citizens of Israel, and allowing all Palestinians the right to return to the land of Palestine in line with United Nations’ resolution 194.
Voting against BDS is a vote for our Palestinian people back home to continue facing genocide and crimes against humanity, which the support of five unethical companies that our university unfortunately has strong ties with. We all have a duty to reject taking part in genocide.
The following text was provided by the speaker for the idea as supporting evidence, when this idea was discussed at Guild Summit. This is provided to help students make an informed decision on the idea: February 2024 Summit – Proposer Statement