Students at Harvard University are demonstrating their steadfast support of Palestinians in Gaza with a string of protests, including an hourslong hunger strike and “die-in” during class hours.
On Friday, about 30 students went without food until the early evening to stand in solidarity with 17 Brown University students who rejected food for at least 8 days, the Harvard Crimson reported.
The goal of the hunger strike for Brown students was to see the Brown corporation cut ties with “companies which profit from human rights abuses in Palestine,” according to the report.
Brown University president Christina Paxson rejected the demand to divest, citing the protesters’ “now-obsolete demands,” the report noted.
Nevertheless, the goal appeared to resonate with Harvard’s Palestine Solidarity Committee.
“To send solidarity to @browndivestcoalition for their incredible hunger strike, 30+ Harvard students committed to a day-long hunger strike to prove to university corporations that we will not back down,” the group posted on Instagram.
The hunger strike lasted for 12 hours and ended at 5 p.m., according to the report.
Following up on the hunger strike, students with Harvard Out of Occupied Palestine held a “die-in” protest on the steps of the Widener Library to call out the university’s complicity in the alleged Israeli occupation and genocide of Palestinians, the Harvard Crimson reported Monday.
“The Israeli Occupation Forces murdered more than 100 Palestinian the last ‘safe zone’ in Gaza,” HOOP wrote in a statement reacting to the Israeli strike on Rafah.
“Harvard is complicit through its investments in Occupied Palestine, and we planned this demonstration to demand its divestment and disrupt normalcy during genocide.”
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During the “die-in,” students, the overwhelming majority of whom were masked, lied on the ground, accused the university of trying to silence them, and repeated the words of Palestinian writer and poet Refaat Alareer, “If I must die.”
When totaling tuition, fees, housing, food, books, and personal expenses, the total billed and unbilled cost of attending Harvard University for the 2023-2024 school year is upwards of $87,450.