Palazzo Nuovo in Turin, home to the humanities faculties of the University of Turin, has been occupied by students for the past two weeks, together with the Physics headquarters and the Polytechnic.
The reasons for the occupation, which led some degree courses to carry out online lessons, concern the war between Israel and Palestine, in particular the collaborations of the two universities (UniTo and PoliTo) with Israeli universities and war industry companies. UniTo in particular has, in its over 500 international agreements, 9 agreements with Israeli universities.
The four requests of the hundreds of students have been widespread since the first days: “we ask – we read in a statement released by the Student Intifada movement – the definitive interruption of all academic agreements between UniTo and all institutions, academies and companies in Israel ; the termination of all agreements between UniTo and the war industry; the declassification and public list of all agreements between Regno and third parties; the public and formal position taken by the Rector and the academic Senate of UniTo in favor of blocking the shipment of war armaments to Israel, for a total ceasefire, for the interruption of Israeli military operations on Rafah and Jabalia”.
The Turin occupation is not an isolated case. All over the world, students are calling for a ceasefire; the wave of protests started in the United States with the occupation of Columbia University, followed by the University of California (UCLA) and the City College of New York. There are also protests in Paris, Berlin, Amsterdam, as well as in Italy in Padua, Milan, Pisa, Florence, Rome.
