Amid escalating boycott campaigns against entities supporting the Israeli occupation, students of the American University in Cairo, located near Tahrir Square in the capital, raised demands on Monday aimed at boycotting the French insurance company “AXA” and “HP Inc.” for financing the Israeli occupation forces, settlements, and the apartheid system in occupied Palestine, as reported by a page representing students specializing in anthropology and Egyptology on Instagram.
The Israeli occupation forces continue to commit massacres in Gaza for the 200th consecutive day. According to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, the death toll has reached approximately 34,097 victims, with 76,980 injured, in addition to 11,000 missing under the rubble who have yet to be found.
Zawia3 reached out to several students and faculty members of the American University, who disclosed that some students organized an event last Thursday to support Gaza. Among the attendees was a Palestinian youth who had escaped from the sector while injured and received medical services at Nasser Institute Hospital. According to the students, he provided testimony describing everything that had happened inside the sector up until his departure.
According to a faculty member at the university (who preferred not to be named), the American University typically holds a cultural week each year, which began last Saturday and features various cultural and artistic activities. However, at the end of yesterday’s celebration, a group of students ascended the memorial “Ewart” stage and presented their demands, part of a boycott against all economic entities supporting the occupation, including the mentioned companies.
According to the faculty member, the demands presented yesterday were not related to the university’s student union, but rather a group of students and graduates specializing in anthropology and Egyptology who are accustomed to organizing protests related to the Palestinian issue and Egyptian public affairs. They coordinate through a private closed group on a messaging app.
The students attempted to read out all their demands and direct questions to Ahmed Dallal, the university president, amidst security restrictions that involved shutting off lights to disperse them, with one participating student reportedly assaulted. They chanted against security restrictions and the university’s support for the occupation, with slogans like: “Oh AUC students, your university supports Zionism. Turn off the lights even more, the university supports the entity. Listen Ahmed Dallal, no to occupation companies. Oh Egyptian university students, revolt against Zionism.”
The students issued a statement saying: “As students, graduates, faculty members, and staff at the American University in Cairo, we can only feel extreme shame at the university’s complicity in the systematic violence faced by Palestinians at the hands of Zionist Israel. Despite many official avenues, including student protests and objections submitted to the university administration, as well as a petition from faculty members submitted last November that remains unanswered by the administration, demanding the boycott of AXA and HP Inc. as well as full disclosure of the university’s investments, we have been continuously ignored.”
The statement adds: “The university needs to adhere to its Resolution 458, passed on May 28, 2008, and respond to our demands that we have submitted.” The students called for signing a petition demanding the implementation of their demands, rejecting the university administration’s disregard.
The demands raised by university students yesterday include boycotting the mentioned companies, as well as terminating all sponsorship and exchange contracts with any company listed by the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement. The second demand calls on the university administration to commit to transparency in future spending of tuition fees collected from them, insisting that the administration adheres to boycott lists and does not use their funds to finance occupation crimes.
The fourth demand involves the administration committing to amending contracts with vendors on campus in the future and avoiding the supply of goods and products by companies that support the occupation.
Solidarity with Gaza was demonstrated by activists on April 19 last year to demand transparency from the university regarding their spending, accusing it of complicity in the Gaza massacre. They raised the slogan: “Where did our money go? What is the university hiding?”
In commentary, Fadila Khaled, one of the participants, says: “Anthropology and Egyptology students are always concerned about the Palestinian issue and work to organize related activities in support of the cause.” She points out that students were previously part of what was known as the “Jerusalem Club,” focused on all matters related to occupied Palestinian territories, but it ceased to operate for nearly ten years until it was revived for the first time after the Al-Aqsa Flood operation that began on October 7 last year.
She elaborates: “The last two demonstrations at the university were coordinated by the Jerusalem Club in collaboration with the Student Union and a group of ASI students. We discovered in October last year that the university administration had contracted with AXA, then in November we were surprised by its contract with HP Inc., which angered us and prompted us to act immediately by exposing the administration’s practices on social media and calling for protests.”
Khaled mentioned that their demands raised yesterday are legitimate, and they received solidarity from the Jerusalem Club students following their announcement, but she notes that the university’s Student Union has not expressed its opinion yet or declared solidarity.
AXA Insurance Company was later accused in 2019 of funding the Israeli occupation following a report by the non-governmental organization SumOfUs, which fights for economic rights and supports consumer rights to hold financial and economic institutions accountable for ethical violations and human rights and environmental principles. It has over ten million members. The report revealed AXA and its subsidiary AXA Equiti Holdings injected over $91 million at that time into six institutions of the occupation involved in settlement activities in the West Bank, including five banks: Hapoalim Bank, Leumi Bank, Mizrahi Tefahot Bank, First International Bank of Israel, and Israel Discount Bank, in addition to CistaMarra. The company also invested in the Israeli security fence in the West Bank and the apartheid wall, manufacturing illegal weapons, including internationally banned cluster bombs and white phosphorus.
As for HP Inc., an American multinational information technology company headquartered in Palo Alto, California, questions have been raised since last October, and boycotters have emphasized the need to ignore the company’s products, accusing it of supporting and financing Israeli activities inside occupation prisons. According to media reports, the company provides financial support to the occupation in various ways, including donations amounting to millions of dollars to Israeli charities and nonprofit organizations, as well as investing billions of dollars in occupation companies. In 2021, it acquired the Israeli cybersecurity company Niara for $486 million.
According to the students we spoke with, they continue to demand more transparency from the American University administration and the cessation of cooperation with entities and companies supporting the occupation until their demands are met.
