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Rank-and-file activists within the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) organised a national day of action for Palestine on March 26 at nine university campuses.

The NTEU for Palestine protest was endorsed by NTEU campus branches, the National Union of Students and Palestinian and anti-war student collectives. They demanded universities cut all ties with Israeli academic institutions and weapons companies in line with last October’s NTEU national council decision to support a position of Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS).

The actions opposed the new definition of antisemitism, proposed by Universities Australia, which equates criticism of the state of Israel and the ideology of Zionism with discrimination against Jewish people.

Hundreds of university staff say the new definition forms part of a new effort to repress student and university activism.

Markela Panegyres, from Sydney University Staff for Palestine and an organiser with NTEU for Palestine, said after Israel has “systematically violated the ceasefire agreement” and now resumed its genocidal war on the Gaza Strip, “university workers … [must] express solidarity with Palestine and demand our universities cut all ties with Israel.

“Shamefully, the University of Sydney has three student exchange partnerships with Israeli universities, and many partnerships with the military-industrial complex, including the US Department of Defence, Thales and Lockheed Martin,” Panegyres said.

“We will not be silent and will continue to organise against the complicity of this university in genocide and apartheid.”

More than 200 students and staff, including from the University of Technology Sydney, heard speakers condemn management’s attack on free speech. A call was made for a student general meeting to “reject the new antisemitism definition and fight off university management’s attacks on our right to protest”.

Students Against War condemned the University of Sydney’s “McCarthyist offensive” against the Palestine solidarity movement, academic freedom and freedom of speech. It said the disciplinary action against Luna, a transgender asylum seeker student, puts her at risk of being forced into immigration detention. Her crime was allegedly writing pro-Palestine slogans on a university whiteboard.

“The kind of unjust treatment that Luna faces will only become more common if the UA definition of antisemitism is not challenged, along with the draconian Campus Access Policy (CAP) under which Luna was disciplined.

“The CAP gives uni management control over whether students can exercise democratic freedoms like holding a stall or displaying a sign. The uni is even trying to ban lecture announcements at the start of class.”

“We will not tolerate Sydney Uni treating us like criminals for criticising Israel. The real crime is the uni’s research, exchange and investment links with the terror state and the companies that arm and enable it.”

Jasmine Ali, from BDS UniMelb, said the university’s new restrictive measures “undermine the essential rights of staff and students to draw attention to important political and social issues on campus”.

“New regulations curtailing the right to protest on campus and increasing surveillance powers over staff and students using the university wireless network are anti-democratic actions that target those who oppose the violent and oppressive actions of the Israeli state.”

Demilitarise RMIT said while Israel resumes it devastating genocidal war on Gaza and the West Bank, universities, including RMIT, have escalated “efforts to stifle freedom of speech, expression, assembly and academic freedom”. The group called on the university to cut ties with weapons manufacturers and “protect and meaningfully support our Palestinian staff and students, who are under the greatest pressure to self-censor and fall in line”.

Michelle Berkon, from Jews Against the Occupation ’48, who spoke at the protest at the University of Sydney, said: “When we say ‘abolish genocidal states’, the ruling classes realise that we have seen the problem, and they will use whatever means at their disposal to neutralise that threat.

“Currently, their weapon of choice is antisemitism and their shield of choice is Jewish people. Let us never forget, however, that their victims are the Palestinian people.”

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Michelle Berkon, from Jews Against the Occupation ’48, addressing the protest, March 26. Photo: Jim McIlroy