Student Movement Thrives Despite Efforts to Shut Down NSJP
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Overcoming an international campaign attempting to censor the 9th National Students for Justice in Palestine (NSJP) conference, hundreds of students gathered Nov. 1-3 at the University of Minnesota (UMN) to strengthen student organizing across the country. Three Palestine Legal staff attended the conference.
“We were really inspired to see the work of an all-volunteer student team to bring together hundreds of activists committed to freedom and justice for all people,” said Amira Mattar, Palestine Legal’s Michael Ratner Justice Fellow. “Students put together this conference in the face of systemic censorship, which did not deter them.”
NSJP and its attendees were subject to numerous attacks during and leading up to the conference.
A McCarthyist online group called “Radical Alert” posted pictures of conference attendees under the label “Jew-hater,” linking to their social media accounts. These posts targeted Arab, Black, and Jewish attendees and resulted in dozens of racist and violent threats from Radical Alert followers.
Four people, seemingly associated with Radical Alert, also stood outside the conference venue wearing shirts that read “SJP: condemn slavery now” and handed out professionally printed flyers absurdly implying that NSJP supports slavery.
“It seems that pro-Israel actors organized a group of Black women to act as fake protesters and distribute propaganda attacking the conference, while having no qualms doxxing a Black conference participant who supports Palestinian rights and subjecting them to racist vitriol and violent threats,” said communications manager Kristian Davis Bailey. “This seems to repeat what the Hoover Institution did in 2016, when it orchestrated a fake protest by busing in paid protesters to the NSJP conference at George Mason University.”
Throughout the conference, unidentified individuals took pictures of attendees as they entered and exited the venue. When students covered their faces, Israel proxy groups took to social media to allege that the students had something to hide.
“This is classic bullying. It has become routine for anonymous pro-Israel groups to stalk, cyber-harass, and blacklist student activists. When students try to protect themselves by hiding their faces, the propaganda artists accuse the victims of being secretive,” said senior staff attorney Liz Jackson. “It is the bullies acting as proxies for the Israeli state who are hiding behind anonymity while attacking a movement for justice primarily led by students of color.”
Right: Unidentified person who was taking pictures of conference attendees.
The harassment of conference participants followed a months-long campaign to shut down the NSJP conference. An Israeli government-sponsored app directed people to complain of an unsafe environment on campus. Anonymous websites published meritless reports smearing conference facilitators with false accusations of support for terrorism. Israel lobbyists produced a report calling on the University of Minnesota to cancel and monitor the conference.
Despite this, NSJP continued stronger than ever. The conference had over 350 attendees from across the U.S. and Canada. The University of Minnesota respected the right to hold on-campus discussion about Palestinian freedom.
Palestine Legal’s Know Your Rights workshop at NSJP
The conference hosted a series of workshops about Palestinian history, cross-solidarity relationships between social movements, and celebrations of Palestinian culture. Palestine Legal hosted a Know Your Rights workshop for dozens of students concerned about suppression of Palestine advocacy.
Attendees included students from the recently official Fordham SJP, which had to file a lawsuit against the university in order to organize on campus.
Contact Us
Palestine Legal encourages any students who experienced suppression, online intimidation, false accusations, or university obstacles for attending NSJP to contact us. Students can ask questions, get confidential support, or simply document what you have experienced.