Australian university campuses have been the sites of student protests for decades. Protests have supported civil rights and denounced war and apartheid.
Indeed, history shows, student activism drives meaningful change.
As our universities are places intended to build skills of critical enquiry, moral development and deep knowledge, we should not be surprised when our students act on issues about which they are deeply concerned. These issues are often subjects of study in their law, history, sociology, international relations and other degrees. In their actions, students are exercising skills that many of our universities identify as core graduate attributes, including critical thinking and global citizenship.
The recent escalation of violence between Israel and Palestine has strengthened the student protest movement at Australian universities. Hamas’ breaking of Israel’s devastating 16-year siege of Gaza on 7 October 2023 led to 1,139 deaths in gruesome violence — with some killings attributed to Israeli fire — and the taking of Israeli and foreign hostages has been followed by almost a year of Israeli bombing and attacks on Gaza. Gazans have repeatedly been forced from their homes into Israeli-declared “safe zones”, where their struggle for survival continues amidst ongoing massacres, even within these so-called “safe zones”. The scale of death and devastation has sparked global protests. In July, The Lancet estimated that, based on ratios of indirect to direct violent deaths documented in wars and conflicts, at least 186,000 deaths are likely to be attributable to the ongoing conflict in Gaza.
From April, students in Australia established Gaza Solidarity tent encampments, making calls for their universities to “disclose their ties with Israel, divest from those ties and sign on to the international Boycott Divestment & Sanctions statement”. Vitally, those present at university encampments have been Jewish students and the encampments have repeatedly denounced antisemitism at their rallies and teach-ins.
We note the International Court of Justice’s ruling of 26 January that Israel’s acts could amount to plausible genocide and its issuing of six provisional measures on Israel. This was complemented by the ICJ ruling of 19 July that Israel’s continued occupation of Palestinian territory is unlawful. On 17 September, the UN General Assembly demanded Israel end its illegal presence in occupied Palestinian territory.
Now, almost one year into the continuing onslaught on Gaza and the holding of hostages, Coalition Senator Sarah Henderson has brought a bill entitled “Commission of Inquiry into Antisemitism at Australian Universities Bill 2024 (No. 2)”. Henderson’s Bill alleges “since the 7 October 2023 terrorist attacks by Hamas in Israel, antisemitism across the country, and particularly on university campuses, has reached unprecedented levels. Some of that antisemitism has been undirected and expressed through protests; in other instances, Jewish staff and students have been directly harassed and intimidated on campus”.
Dr Matthew Brown, deputy chief executive of the Group of Eight Universities, presented a statement at the opening discussions of the Bill on 20 September, in which he discussed universities’ concern about antisemitism in the wake of the 7 October attacks and growing societal divisions. Brown’s assessment proposes to balance the rights of free speech and protest, long honoured at Australian universities, with the need for responsible limits to free speech in support of “campus safety” in the face of community divisions over the actions of Israel against Palestine.
Vice-chancellor Professor Mark Scott of the University of Sydney also spoke on the first day of discussions and apologised in response to representations from Jewish students expressing distress about alleged antisemitism they experienced on university campuses. He stated: “Yes, I have failed them and the university has failed them and that is why we have made significant changes to our policy settings.” On 17 June, he had demanded the encampment at his university be disbanded.
Brown and others fail to acknowledge that the campus protests were, and still are, advocating for human rights and respect for international law and criticising Israel for extreme violations of these. These violations have been recognised by members of Australia’s Jewish community who have spoken out against Israel’s repeated violations of international law and human rights.
This confounding of antisemitism with criticisms and denunciations of the Israeli state’s repeated violations is a key issue in these dynamics. The Bill has adopted the nonbinding working definition of antisemitism (and its examples) that was developed in 2005 and officially adopted in 2016 by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance. It was first given effect by an Executive Order from former President Donald Trump in December 2019, reflecting US government policy. The drafter of the working definition, US attorney Kenneth S. Stern, stated at the time of the order: “It was never intended to be a campus hate speech code, but that’s what Donald Trump’s executive order accomplished this week. This order is an attack on academic freedom and free speech, and will harm not only pro-Palestinian advocates, but also Jewish students and faculty, and the academy itself.”
Rightly, the Jewish Council of Australia, in their submission opposing the Bill, stated, “the framing of this Bill will be counter-productive in tackling the very real rise in antisemitism in Australian society, and its passage would be used to shut down free speech on campus in support of Palestinian rights. This would ultimately disadvantage everyone, including Jewish staff and students”.
Senator Henderson’s bill is a political manoeuvre that is another front in the culture wars that have come to feature in Australian politics, with universities being a key target. This is evidenced when the bill states: “University authorities have consistently failed to adequately deal with this issue, both before and since 7 October 2023. This is clearly a broad cultural problem, as it is occurring at all Australian universities over many years.” This follows from an earlier skirmish in the culture wars on campus that resulted in the 2019 French Independent Review into freedom of speech in Australian universities. This found allegations of a free speech crisis were “unsubstantiated” and offered a model code for the protection of freedom of speech and academic freedom for universities to consider. By the end of 2021, all 42 universities had either adopted the model code or adapted it to their context.
The Henderson Bill is unnecessary and misguided, especially because an inquiry is already underway that will address these issues in a more holistic, fair and impactful manner, and is positively embraced by universities. This is the Australian Human Rights Commission’s assignment to conduct a “groundbreaking independent study to better understand and address the dangerous prevalence of racism at universities”. Its focus is importantly broader than antisemitism as “it will address all forms of racism, including the antisemitism, Islamophobia and anti-Arab racism currently being seen on campuses, and systemic racist practices against First Nations student and staff”.
We concur with the assessment of the Jewish Council of Australia, which argued against the Bill for these reasons:
- Its potential to drive policy which suppresses legitimate speech, academic freedom, protest and debate on University campuses;
- Its use of contested definitions of antisemitism, including the IHRA definition, which conflate criticism of Israel with racial prejudice;
- Its reliance on methodologically unsound survey data; and
- Its incompatibility with the French Review of Freedom of Speech in Australian Higher Education Providers (2019).
Our universities are sites of struggle because they are so important to the shaping of the nation and supporting its critical capacities in being a responsible member of the global community. There have been many attempts in the previous decade at political interference in manipulating the critical roles that universities, their faculty and their students play in contributing to the shaping of our society.
This most recent attempt at political interference must be rebuffed in favour of the more broadly tasked and effective approach assigned to the Australian Human Rights Commission to ensure our universities are places where racism and discrimination — including Islamophobia, anti-Palestinianism, antisemitism, anti-First Nations — are challenged and denied. A holistic and intersectional approach to these forms of racism will ensure that it is a commitment to free speech, humanism and human rights that features in our universities and not political power plays and manipulations.
Because student activism has played such a meaningful role in social change for civil and human rights recognition, we must ensure that the recent student actions at Australian university campuses are not allowed to be misrepresented in these political manoeuvrings. Our university students have conducted themselves well and in the best traditions of the earlier generations of student activists whose actions, in retrospect, were always on the right side of history. Let’s not lose sight of this as we look to strengthen our universities’ abilities to refuse and fight racism in all its many forms and support greater free speech, humanity and human rights.
Authors:
Dr Freya Higgins-Desbiolles, University of South Australia
Prof. Fran Baum AO, University of Adelaide
A/Prof Barbara Baird AM, Flinders University
Prof. Mohamad Abdalla AM, University of South Australia
Dr Sanam Mustafa, University of Adelaide
Prof. Jon Jureidini, University of Adelaide
Dr Jack Desbiolles, University of South Australia
The authors are associated with Academics for Palestine-SA, an advocacy group of South Australian University staff concerned about human rights abuses in Palestine.