Dear,

President Dr. Sabah Randhawa,

Western Washington University’s Board of Trustees,

Students, Faculty, Staff,

and Bellingham community

We write this letter as a diverse and rapidly growing coalition of student organizations, led by Western Washington University’s Jewish Voice for Peace and Arab Student Association. We are united in our unshakeable demand for a free and liberated Palestine. Thus, we invoke the power of our position as students to demand Western Washington University to cut ties with and divest from Israel’s genocidal, settler-colonial occupation of Palestine, and all institutions implicated in supporting the apartheid regime.

As we make these demands for the decolonization of Palestine and an end to the genocide of the Palestinian people, we recognize that we live and study on stolen land. We stand in solidarity with the struggles of the Indigenous peoples of these lands and waters, the Nooksack Tribe, Lummi Nation, and other Coast Salish peoples, and their decolonization movement. These movements for liberation and decolonization are intertwined and require attention as we fight for the liberation of all peoples.

These are our demands:

1. ACKNOWLEDGE HARM AND CORRECT WRONGS - Publicly acknowledge the harm that the University has inflicted upon Arab and Arab-American students on campus through lack of support, silence during the genocide of Palestinian people, and demonization of the Arab and Arab-American students. The administration has continually failed to protect Arab and Arab-American students from harassment and has actively spread misinformation about the word Intifada and other protest chants, endangering Arab and Arab-American students. This is unacceptable and must be acknowledged publicly. ULTIMATELY, Western must collaborate with students and faculty to adopt an institutional definition of antisemitism that clearly distinguishes antisemitism and anti-Zionism, protects the right to condemn Zionism as a racist endeavor, and the right to condemn the existence of the apartheid, settler-colonial state that is Israel.

2. FULL FINANCIAL DISCLOSURE - Disclose all direct and indirect investments, agreements, and contracts with companies and institutions complicit in Israel’s illegal settler-colonial occupation of Palestine. This includes but is not limited to all weapons manufacturing companies and all companies on the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) list^[1].

3. COMPLETE DIVESTMENT FROM ISRAEL - End all direct and indirect investments, agreements, and contracts with companies and institutions complicit in Israel’s illegal settler-colonial occupation of Palestine. This includes all direct and indirect investments in weapons manufacturing companies and companies on the BDS list. This requires the termination of all academic and financial relationships with Boeing. Remove Sabra Hummus from the dining halls and campus markets. Cut all ties with The Hewlett-Packard (HP) Company. Immediately and permanently cancel the study abroad program at Haifa University and cancel all current and future forms of cooperation with Israeli academic institutions.

4. INVEST IN COMMUNITY -  Ensure the success of the Ethnic Studies department launch in Fall 2024 by creating three additional visiting positions for the 2024-2025 academic year with the possibility of renewal (in the areas of decolonial studies, global liberation struggles, postcolonial studies, post-imperial studies, and transnational feminisms). Create a permanent line item in the university budget to fund an annual faculty teach-in that centers a decolonialist approach to academia. This must include material that centers on the racist history of the United States’ academic institutions through the perpetuation of colonization on Turtle Island and abroad. Finally, provide funding for a quarterly workshop focused on movement building and solidarity amongst various student groups, facilitated by an individual approved by the Ethnic Studies Department.

5.  SCHEDULE AN EMERGENCY BOARD OF TRUSTEES MEETING to discuss our demands. ASA and JVP representatives and elected allies must be allowed to attend.

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Western Washington University’s Endowment is managed by an investment company called Russell Investments, in Seattle. WWU provides no transparency to where our money is invested.

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We draw strength and resolve from the long history of anti-Zionist organizing and solidarity work, and we make these demands with the knowledge that the dignity and liberation of Palestinian people and Jewish people are irrevocably intertwined. We believe in the necessity of critiquing and holding the State of Israel accountable for its egregious crimes against humanity and willful violations of international law. We vehemently reject the narrative that Judaism and Zionism are one and the same, and we stand firm in our commitment to the Palestinian liberation movement and to Judaism beyond Zionism.

We deserve an education that does not fund genocide, apartheid, or war. We deserve an education that does not rely on the exploitation and destruction of others. We deserve an education that does not fan the flames of hate and spread divisive lies and destructive historical omissions.

People in Palestine deserve to live. We demand that our tuition dollars be divested from the genocide of Palestinian people. None of us are free until all of us are free.

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A version of this letter was originally presented to Western Washington University’s administration on Friday May 3rd, 2024.

This letter represents the most updated version, which did not undergo any significant changes.

This letter is officially dated Tuesday May 7th, 2024.

Signed,

WWU ASA and JVP