«A letter published by some press agencies urged me not to lock myself away in what has been defined as the “ivory tower of the rectorate”. On my way I saw a sign asking me what I thought about what is happening in Gaza. I don’t want to leave this question unanswered.”
President Sergio Mattarella, at the Sapienza for the award ceremony for new graduates, takes the opportunity to respond to the pro-Gaza students. And he does so, first of all, by specifying the position “already expressed”, among other things, “at the general assembly of the United Nations, or with the letter that I sent the day before yesterday for Israel’s Republic Day”.
On those occasions, Mattarella said, “I reiterated the request for an immediate ceasefire”.
«The need to respect the humanitarian law”Mattarella immediately underlines, «is in ours Constitution. It applies in all directions: for the people Palestinianfor the boys raped and killed while listening to music at a rave last October 7, for the children slaughtered that day, for Mahsa Amini and for the girls who after her were imprisoned because they wore bad the veilfor girls who cannot study in Afghanistan. For our Republic, all violations of human rights must be combated, always. The sentence for oppression and refusal of violence does not change depending on the territories and states.”
«Freedom, peace, human rights pass through dialogue, comparison and free circulation of their valueagainst violence and hatred which, when spreading, lead to horrifying results, like yesterday in Slovakia”, he said, referring to the attack on the Slovak prime minister Robert Fico.
The invitation to Mattarella from the tent boys
The letter to which Mattarella referred was written by some students of the pro-Palestinian collectives.
«We believe that in this historical moment, and given the current circumstances or the fixed presence of the tents against the genocide in Gaza, its visit at Sapienza cannot take place in ivory tower of the rector’s office to which, as has been demonstrated several times, the access of male and female students is restricted. There we invite therefore a reach us – the students had written in a message addressed to the Head of State – at the garrison of the tents, to finally have that discussion with the institutions that we have been asking for for a long time now”.
Water and paper airplanes
As soon as the president arrived, some students even launched attacks on the police cordon defending the rector’s office waterfall from little bottles plastic and airplanes Of paper. A procession, shouting “Free Palestine”, started at 5.50 pm inside the university. There weren’t any accidents.
