Today, students blocked the entrance to the building of Paris’s prestigious Sciences Po university, demanding that the institution’s leadership condemn Israel’s military actions in the current offensive in the Gaza Strip. Sciences Po has been known in recent years to be dominated by progressives and various intolerant movements. This is reported by the Reuters agency. But according to Jean-Luc Mélenchon, head of the leftist France Unsubdued party, the protesting students are an honor for France.
The students chanted in support of the Palestinians and hung Palestinian flags in the windows and over the entrance to the building. Several of them wore a black and white scarf, which has become a symbol of solidarity with the Palestinians. “When we see what’s happening in the United States and now in Australia, we really hope it catches on here in France. The academic world has a role to play,” said Hisham, 22, a master’s student in human rights and humanitarian studies at the Institute of political studies (Sciences Po). According to him, the students demand that the Paris Institute of Political Studies condemn Israel’s actions.
“We are happy that more and more students and universities are mobilizing,” Zoe, 22, a master’s student in public administration, told Reuters. Officials at Sciences Po did not respond to a request for comment.
Today the protesting students were warmly greeted by the chairman of the left-wing party Unsubdued France Mélenchon. “I wanted to send you my most grateful and admirable greeting for the work you have done in occupying the compound…” he said. “For us at this moment, you are the honor of our country,” added Jean-Luc Mélenchon.
Students at a prestigious Paris university renewed pro-Palestinian protests inspired by those at universities in the United States, two days after French police broke up a demonstration on Wednesday.
US universities saw renewed clashes between police and students protesting Israel’s offensive in the Gaza Strip on Thursday, raising questions about police methods used to quell the protests. These intensified after the mass arrests at New York’s Columbia University last week. Pro-Palestinian protests have also taken place at a number of American universities from the East Coast to the West Coast of the United States.
Israel launched the offensive in the Gaza Strip after a terrorist attack by Hamas and its allies in Israel on October 7, according to Israeli authorities, killed about 1,200 people and kidnapped another 250. In the first and so far only ceasefire at the end of November, less than half of the hostages were released in exchange for Palestinian prisoners. More than 34,000 Palestinians have been killed in the Gaza Strip since the start of the war, according to the Hamas government’s health ministry.
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