CWRU Student Government votes to pursue divestment from “Israeli apartheid”

Ohio (QNN)- The Undergraduate Student Government (USG) of Case Western Reserve University (CWRU) voted overwhelmingly on Wednesday evening in support of a bill endorsing the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement.

On Nov. 8, the USG General Assembly (GA) voted decisively in support of Resolution 31-15, the “Students for Justice in Palestine” bill, authored by Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), several reports confirmed.

The bill recognizes ‘Israel’ as an “apartheid state”, unlawfully imprisoning minors, and assassinating dissidents. Charging that the university is “culpable for the oppression of the Palestinian people,” it demands that the university divest from companies that do business with ‘Israel’ “within two years.”

Though the vote was expected to be close, having been put off by previous years’ USG bodies since 2018, the final vote was conclusive, with 35 votes in support of the resolution, 17 votes against and seven abstentions.

The bill lists specific targets for divestment, including weapons companies like Lockheed Martin and Raytheon, private prison companies like the GEO Group and CoreCivic (formerly known as the Corrections Corporation of America) and various companies that “facilitate the building, maintenance, or economic development of illegal Israeli settlements, outposts, and settler-only roads and transportation systems on occupied Palestinian territory.”

Supporters of the bill reiterated that this was not strictly a BDS bill, though it is born out of that movement, and instead was purely investigatory to see if CWRU was supporting companies and institutions that cause human suffering.

“This bill is to determine where our money is going,” one student said. “This is not a Jewish versus Palestinian issue. This is a ‘look at where we are spending our money’ issue.”

One Palestinian-American student stated, “I can’t go back home to my home country,” referring to the travel restrictions imposed on Palestinians in ‘Israel’. “My family is getting bombed, rocketed, and all of that and yet here I am trying to let my voice be heard. I was scared to even put on the hijab on campus because when I said I was going to, I had friends that said we would not associate with you.”

One Jewish student who voiced support for the bill expressed distaste for other students claiming to speak for the entire Jewish community, stating, “One concerning thing I’m hearing today, especially from other Jewish students, is the conflation of Judaism and Zionism. It’s often an attack used by antisemites to push antisemitic rhetoric. Just because someone is Jewish does not mean they’re Zionist.” He also added that while antisemitism is a real issue, “voting ‘no’ on this bill will have equal if not greater consequences for the opposing side, oftentimes a less represented group on campus here.”

Following the passage of the bill, supporters of the bill stood to their feet in applause while opposers walked out.