The University of Geneva was partially occupied by students mobilized in favor of the Palestinian cause until Tuesday, May 14. After a final mobilization around the main building on May 13, the police evacuated the fifty students still sleeping on the premises very early this morning.
3 mins
There were several hundred of them on Monday, between 400 and 500 according to estimates, who met on Monday in front of the main building of the University of Geneva, in Swiss. The demands are the same as on all other campuses. Élisabetha, member of the Palestine Students coordination, is delighted with some victories: “ What we managed to obtain is that the University of Geneva is committed to encouraging the reception of Palestinian researchers. “, she congratulates herself. On the other hand, ” the university refuses a clear call for a ceasefire and also to boycott Israeli universities », explains the young woman.
The rectorate, for its part, demanded an end to the nighttime occupation of the premises and the removal of controversial banners. But no agreement was reached with the activists ordered to pack up. The university management raised its voice on Monday after the failure of negotiations, announcing the filing of a criminal complaint for home invasion against the mobilized students. “ We don’t understand why they are asking to evacuateexclaims Élisabetha. We are exercising a fundamental right. We are not preventing classes from taking place, nor the proper functioning of the university. “.
An early morning evacuation this Tuesday
However, the evacuation did take place very early Tuesday morning, at 5 a.m. local time (3 a.m. UT), according to a journalist from the Keystone-ATS news agency present on site. The police intervened to evict the fifty students still occupying it. “ Most of the demonstrators were asleep. After being rounded up, they were directed to the facility’s underground parking lot », Reports Julie Zaugg, journalist for LémanbleuTV television on the social network
“ A small committee waits in front of the entrance to this parking lot, constantly clapping and shouting slogans in support of Palestine or their comrades », specifies the journalist, adding having seen students “ handcuffed then loaded into trucks » police with barred windows.
As elsewhere in Switzerland, the mobilization will in any case have caused a lot of noise, well beyond the student community. Former Green MP Ueli Leunberger came in support before the evacuation: “ The boycott is temporary, until the Israeli government stops this aggression. The youth who demonstrate there, with people who are less young, this movement is extremely important “.
The student movement in support of the Palestinians, inspired by the campus occupations in the United States, began at the University of Lausanne and has since spread, more or less temporarily, to other universities in the country, including Fribourg, Basel, Bern and the prestigious polytechnic schools of Lausanne and Zurich.
The accent of othersConflict in the Middle East: student mobilization for Gaza reaches Switzerland