As BRICUP’s sister organisation Artists for Palestine UK reports, the Royal Ballet and Opera, in response to its performers and staff, have decided to cease performing in Israel. Support for the performing arts is often justified on the grounds that they increase our sensitivity to the human condition. It is gratifying to see such powerful…
4 August 2025 This call for action comes from teachers and employees of Birzeit University who have endured the emotional torture of living just a few dozen kilometres from Gaza where Israeli forces are brutally attacking their colleagues, friends and family every single day. Union of Teachers & Employees of Birzeit University Ramallah – Palestine…
4 August 2025 Dean Baker, chief economist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, presents a highly plausible explanation of Trump’s objective in attacking Columbia, Harvard and other leading universities in America and why they are unwise to yield to him. Donald Trump’s Harvard Extortion and the Kneel-Liberals Jul 29, 2025 By Dean Baker The…
2 August 2025 The sign-up page is available by clicking on this link. Philosophers for Peace An Open Letter to the Global Intellectual Community Humanity stands at a critical juncture, facing an unprecedented moral and legal rupture that threatens the very foundations of the international order. The ongoing mass killings of thousands of civilians in…
2 August 2025 Professor Rashid Khalidi, the Edward Said Professor Emeritus of Modern Middle East Studies at Columbia University, has issued the following open letter to Professor Claire Shipman, the Acting President, reprinted here from the Guardian, explaining why he will not teach his popular course this autumn. I spent decades at Columbia. I’m withdrawing…
1 August 2025 Marianne Hirsch is the William Peterfield Trent Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University, Professor in the Institute for Research on Women, Gender, and Sexuality, past president of the Modern Language Association and an authority on the holocaust. Her explanation of the dilemma the Columbia University settlement with the Administration…
1 August 2025 The Government promised to get tough with universities that ‘no platform’ speakers and has now introduced severe penalties for offending institutions, as this article in The Evening Standard describes. No doubt, this will impress some members of the public. But – as the article fails to mention – almost all the instances…
31 July 2025 Palestinian students in Gaza, where the universities have been destroyed by Israel using British war materials, are finding it impossible to take up places in British universities because the British government will not adapt its visa requirements to meet present circumstances, as this report in the Guardian explains. This is symptomatic of…
29 July 2025 Prominent Israelis from the political and cultural establishment have issued a remarkably frank statement appealing to the world to impose swingeing sanctions to persuade their own government to accept a permanent ceasefire in Gaza. Here is the Guardian‘s report on their appeal. Ironically, it appeared on the same day as Prime Minister…
29 July 2025 A report remarkable for its historical perspective on the deepseated character of racism at Edinburgh University is encouraging its administrators to think again about policies which have long favoured Israel to the disadvantage of Palestinians. Here is the Guardian‘s report on this hopeful development. Edinburgh University could unadopt antisemitism definition after report…