Columbia University Climate School

Movement to Boycott and Divest from Israeli Apartheid

Columbia University students have had a strong history of advocacy for divestment. In 1968, Columbia students peacefully occupied campus buildings calling for the administrations to cut ties on research for the Vietnam War. Nearly two decades later, in 1985, students pushed Columbia to become the first Ivy League university in the United States to divest from apartheid South Africa. Successful advocacy campaigns continued, when in 2015, Columbia became the first college in the country to divest from private prison companies. More recently, in 2021, Columbia administration announced a formalized policy barring investment in fossil fuel companies.

Now, as student representatives of the Climate School tasked with upholding student interests and principles of justice, we have a duty to call for the same divestment from Israeli apartheid––a feat which other universities across the country, including Harvard Law School, UC Davis, UCLA, and many others have already called for.

There have been several calls to divest from Israel’s apartheid at Columbia University in the last several years. In 2018, 64 percent of Barnard students voted in favor of a referendum calling on the Student Government Association to petition the administration to divest from eight companies that “profit from or engage in the State of Israel’s treatment of Palestinians.” Nearly half of Barnard’s students voted in that election, which at the time was the highest recorded electoral participation. Following several years of advocacy efforts, in 2020, Columbia College’s student body voted to divest from companies that profit off of Israeli apartheid, with 61 percent of respondents voting in favor to divest––however, this vote was overturned by then President Lee Bollinger on the grounds that there was “no consensus across the University community about this issue.”

Despite the overwhelming call for divestment represented by the Columbia University Apartheid Divest (CUAD), a coalition of nearly 100 student groups and previous divestment votes, the administration has yet to act. Even the Advisory Committee on Socially Responsible Investing (ACSRI) has denied a formal request for divestment received on Dec. 1. Two out of the three Faculty and ACSRI Chairs holding membership, Lisa Allyn Dale and Mingfang Ting, are faculty at the Climate School.

As students at the Climate School who uphold strict ideals for environmental justice that reflect access to justice for all peoples, it is our duty to divest from funds that support or participate in apartheid as well as the oppression and killing of Palestinian people. Israel’s illegal occupation of the Palestinian territories and siege on Gaza are environmental justice issues that intersect with what we stand for as students of the Climate School: equal access to water, clean air, agriculture, energy, as well as the universal right to life. Environmental justice is inherent with access to land, water, sovereignty, and self-determination.

As of Monday, March 4, 2024, CUAD has initiated referenda processes to divest from Israeli apartheid and genocide across more than 17 schools at Columbia University.

Columbia College Student Council (CCSC) have voted and passed a resolution to boycott the use Columbia University’s funds towards companies profiting from or engaged in Israeli apartheid and the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people. Several other schools have initiated the process to vote on boycott and divestment.                                 

Columbia University has actively suppressed student voices on campus. Not only did the university administration amend its event policy without University Senate approval—sidestepping student and faculty voices—leading to the suspension of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), but the university also now faces a potential lawsuit from the New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU). Additionally, Columbia has still refused to acknowledge that a genocide is ongoing, while it plays an active role in this genocide through funding and investing in companies directly profiting from the Isreali apartheid and occupation.

We, the students of Columbia University’s Climate School vehemently condemn the ongoing genocide in Gaza and the University’s complicit role in the killing of tens of thousands of Palestinians. In calling for a lasting ceasefire and progress towards political resolution for the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination, we, the Climate School students at Columbia University, call for the end of the illegal occupation and settlement expansion, in order to attain freedom, justice, and peace for all Palestinians and Israelis.

While there is no way to rectify the pain, suffering, and harm caused by Columbia University’s actions, we hope that this resolution demonstrates our commitment to justice. By no means does this legislation target any group of people based on identity of race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.

Columbia University Climate School

Movement to Boycott and Divest from Israeli Apartheid

Voting Resolution Proposal

​​ “In extending our hands across the miles to the people of Palestine, we do so in the full knowledge that we are part of a humanity that is at one.” - Nelson Mandela (1997)

1. Human rights organizations have long documented Israel’s breaches of international human rights and humanitarian law, including its 57-year occupation of the West Bank and 17-year siege on Gaza.

2. International human rights organizations, including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, as well as Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem, have all designated Israel as an apartheid state. The United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur, also concluded that “apartheid is being practiced by Israel in the occupied Palestinian territory.” In 2021, Human Rights Watch report, “A Threshold Crossed: Israeli Authorities and the Crimes of Apartheid and Persecution” details how Israel practices apartheid and persecution, which are recognized crimes against humanity under the 1973 International Convention of Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid, and under the 1998 Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC). The report makes the case through documentation around the “intent to maintain domination,” “systemic oppression and institutional discrimination,” and “inhumane acts and other abuses of fundamental rights.” In 2022,  B’Tselem released its report, "Not a Vibrant Democracy: This is Apartheid," detailing how Israeli policies relating to citizenship, land occupation and expansion for Jews only, freedom of movement, and political participation, all are proof that Israel is an apartheid state.

3. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) on Jan. 26, 2024, in South Africa’s case alleging that Israel is violating the Genocide Convention, voted in favor of South Africa, concluding that there is a plausible case that Israel’s acts could amount to genocide. South Africa’s evidence in the case of genocide revealed how Israeli government officials, politicians, and military leaders dehumanized Palestinians, inciting violence against them, and “in explicit terms declared their genocidal intent.” The ICJ issued six provisional measures ordering Israel to take all measures within its power to prevent genocidal acts, including preventing and punishing incitement to genocide, ensuring aid and services reach Palestinians under siege in Gaza, and preserving evidence of crimes committed in Gaza.  

4. The Israeli government has failed to comply with the legally binding order for the ICJ and continues to carry out indiscriminate bombing campaigns and a ground invasion against Palestinian civilians in Gaza. Israel continues the obstruction of basic services and humanitarian aid from entry and distribution in Gaza.

5. For nearly six months since Oct. 7, the Israeli government has carried out a carpet-bombing campaign and ground invasion against Palestinians in Gaza. Approximately 32,333 Palestinians in Gaza have been killed by Israel, including 13,000 children and 9,000 women, while 74,694 Palestinians have been critically injured. An estimated 8,000 more are missing, assumed to be dead, or dying, under the rubble of Israel’s bombardment.

6. These numbers are conservative estimates, with accurate counts impeded by Israel’s actions, including: intentionally disrupting Gaza’s telecommunications networks and infrastructure; targeting of journalists; refusing to allow any foreign journalists to report in Gaza unless embedded with the Israeli Forces; establishing an “emergency law” on Oct. 20, 2023 that allows action against any journalist or media outlet in Israel considered to be “harming national morale”; and, forcing all media outlets with offices in Israel covering Gaza to seek approval from the Israeli military before publishing information.

7. Israel is intentionally targeting critical infrastructure, with an estimated 50% to 62% of buildings in Gaza damaged or destroyed, as of January satellite imagery. These estimates are significantly higher two months later, which also does not include the bombardment of Rafah. This includes hospitals, universities, schools, shelters, churches, mosques, homes, neighborhoods, ambulances, medical personnel, UN facilities, aid convoys, journalists and more. Upon South Africa’s submission of provisional measures to the ICJ on Dec. 29, 2023, Israel killed 144 UN members in Gaza, marking the “highest number of aid workers killed in UN history in such a short time.” As of Feb. 28, an estimated 207 cultural and heritage sites have been destroyed, raising concerns of not only a genocide on Palestinian people, but a cultural genocide on the essence of Palestinian culture and its people. No universities remain in Gaza.

8. Israel is conducting acts of collective punishment and the use of starvation as acts of war. The World Food Programme (WFP) Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) concluded that 1.1 million people in Gaza––half of the population––have completely exhausted their food supplies and are struggling with catastrophic hunger and starvation. This is the highest number of people ever recorded facing intentional, man-made famine, of which, the number has doubled in just the last three months.

9. According to the UN, approximately 1.9 million Palestinians (85 percent of the population) have been displaced across the Gaza Strip, the majority of them being displaced multiple times. Families are forced to move repeatedly in search of safety.

10. There has been systemic and forcible transfer and displacement of Palestinian communities and families and expansion of illegal settlements in the West Bank, as well as a rise in settler violence within occupied Palestine territories. According to Amnesty International, in 2023, at least 507 Palestinians were killed, including 81 children, by Israeli Forces and settlers in the illegally occupied Palestinian territories in the West Bank and Jerusalem.

11. Israel's ongoing imposition of military rule over the occupied Palestinian population, contrasted with the full political and civil rights enjoyed by settlers in the same region, constitutes a violation of customary international law and treaty obligations. These include the Fourth Geneva Convention, the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, all of which Israel has signed and ratified.

12. The UN affirms the inalienable, permanent and unqualified right of the Palestinian people to self-determination, including their right to live in freedom, justice and dignity and the right to their independent State of Palestine. It confirms that the right of the Palestinian people to permanent sovereignty over their natural wealth and resources must be used in the interest of their national development, the well-being of the Palestinian people, and as part of the realization of their right to self-determination.

13. States must “ensure respect” for international humanitarian law by parties to an armed conflict, as required by the Geneva Conventions. States must use political sanctions and suspend weapon sales as adopted by the Netherlands, Japan, Spain, Belgium and Canada.

14. The genocide in Gaza and illegal occupation of Palestinian territories is an environmental justice issue. Notably:

1. Environmental concerns are dwarfed in the face of ongoing suffering in war and decades of illegal occupation. According to the State of the Environment and Outlook Report for the occupied Palestinian territories in 2020 by UN Environment Program (UNEP), the impact of occupation and expansion of illegal settlements is impacting the environment in the occupied Palestinian territories through restrictions of movement leading to high urbanization and concentration of populations in poorly organized infrastructure and degradation of accessible agriculture and range land. The lack of political progress has exacerbated environmental governance concerns, especially the impact of illegal Israeli settlements and security measures that cause environmental change and degradation.

2. Currently, in Gaza, the environmental crisis is inseparable from the unfolding humanitarian catastrophe. Israel has destroyed agricultural lands, including generations-old olive trees, as well as essential water resources, leaving remaining ones contaminated. According to preliminary UNEP investigations, to understand the extent of the environmental impact, data suggest that the war has led to a major increase in pollution of land, soil, and water. Debris and hazardous waste are of critical concern, especially as human remains are still under the building debris and as graves have been unearthed and desecrated by the Israeli military. The air pollution associated with solid burning waste increases, in addition to the release of tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions. The intentional blockade of fuel (historically restricted and blocked since Oct. 7) and destruction of renewable energy across critical infrastructure, such as solar panels installed on hospital rooftops, is an energy and environmental justice issue.

3. The first two months of Israel’s bombardment of Gaza resulted in an estimated 281,000 metric tonnes of carbon dioxide from Israel’s ground invasion and aerial bombardment, equivalent to burning more than 150,000 tonnes of coal. These first two months have a larger carbon footprint compared to more than 20 other climate-vulnerable countries. Six months into the genocide, the levels of pollution and long-term impacts of consistent bombardment may have lasting health effects on Palestinians and the environment, including soil, water, marine ecosystems, and the coast. As of March 21, an estimated 40 to 48 percent of tree cover was destroyed.

15. Despite months-long calls for a ceasefire, the US has continued to veto any substantial UN resolution to end the bloodshed. On March 25, the US abstained from voting, and a bare-boned ceasefire resolution passed, calling for an “immediate ceasefire” during Ramadan, a temporary end to Israel’s onslaught, the release of Israeli hostages, and allowing essential humanitarian aid into Gaza. However, Israel continues its bombardment and ground invasion.

16. In the absence of significant global action for a lasting ceasefire, progress towards political resolution, and the exercise of the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination, the US and its allies are complicit in a plausible case of genocide, enabling the illegal occupation and settlement expansion. This complicity has been recognized by several state, legal, and civil society groups, including: a US lawsuit filed against President Joe Biden for failing to “prevent an unfolding genocide”; an ICJ case on Israel’s policies in the West Bank, Gaza, and occupied East Jerusalem; an ICJ case brought by Nicaragua against Germany, calling the country to stop its military support of Israel and to reinstate essential, life-saving, funding of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA); and a criminal complaint against politicians in the United Kingdom, alleging complicity in Israeli war crimes in Gaza.

17. This resolution hopes to hold complicit actors accountable and calls on them to divest from apartheid, with the aim to attain freedom, justice, and peace for all Palestinians and Israelis.

18. The Boycott, Divest, and Sanction (BDS) campaign reclaims global citizens’ political agency and refuses to normalize relationships with companies that are enabling apartheid and profiteering economically from engagement with Israeli apartheid and its illegal settlements. BDS, led by Palestinians, as well as citizens advocating for freedom, justice, and equality, is a movement that urges the international community to pressure Israel to adhere to international law. The ongoing and regularly updated BDS list will be the initial point of reference for boycott and divestment, though this list is subject to change as new information is obtained.

19. Israeli universities actively contribute to Israel's regime of occupation, settler-colonialism, and apartheid. They play a significant role in developing military technologies used in recent war crimes, justifying land colonization, rationalizing ethnic cleansing, providing moral cover for extrajudicial killings, discriminating against non-Jewish students, and violating human rights and international law. In response, Palestinian civil society has called for an academic boycott of complicit Israeli institutions. Many academic associations, student governments, unions, and international academics now support this boycott, refusing to normalize oppression and aiming to end Israel's violations of international law, and end Israel’s apartheid.

Accordingly, the Climate and Society Student Council of Columbia University’s Climate School formally calls on Columbia University to divest from companies and academic institutions that profit from or engage in the State of Israel’s acts of occupation, apartheid, and genocide. We call on Columbia University to:

1. Divest all securities, mutual funds, endowment, and other monetary instruments and refrain from further investment in companies profiting from or engaging in Israeli apartheid; and

2. Cancel the opening of the Tel Aviv Global Center; and

3. Cease the Dual Degree Program between Columbia University and Tel Aviv University.