In 2014, amid aerial bombings and attacks against Palestine which left 2,315+ Palestinians dead, Skidmore saw fit to sign a letter with the rest of the New York Six Consortium refusing to answer student activist calls to divest from companies and schools profiting from Occupied Palestine (also known as Israel). 

The 2014 letter writes, “We will continue to encourage our colleagues to engage with faculty and institutions in Israel and across the world to promote scholarship and the free exchange of ideas, and to provide additional opportunities for our students.” We reject the notion that academic freedom in the U.S. must exist at the cost of Palestinian lives. During this year’s month of Ramadan (as of 5/18/21), Israeli bombings have killed a total of 213 Palestinians and injured 1,442 others. Over 40 schools, 300 homes, 15 hospitals (including the only COVID testing site in Gaza), and the Al Jazeera and AP News headquarters, have been intentionally destroyed. On 5/13, Israeli settlers marched throughout Palestine smashing the windows of Palestinian-owned businesses and chanting “death to Arabs.” 

If our "academic freedom” means the murder of Palestinian peoples, then we wish to take part in no such freedom. This facade of academic freedom, of hearing “both” and “all” sides is often weaponized in the case of liberal arts institutions, and we say NO MORE. We take this moment to ask, are Palestinian students not worthy of academic freedom and exploration? While we continue these relationships with Israeli institutions, we deny Palestinians the safety to education and the right to life. We want to highlight the importance of U.S. institutions’ participation in the academic boycott of Israel. The academic boycott of Israel, as written about by the American Studies Association, means rejecting all associations and collaborations with Israeli institutions, namely, Hebrew University, Technion, Tel Aviv University, Bar Ilan University, Haifa University, Ben Gurion University, and Weizmann Institute. Our connections with these institutions make us complicit in the genocide of Palestinians and the land theft of Palestine. We not only urge Skidmore to partake in the academic boycott but in the BDS movement more broadly. The BDS movement has proven successful as it was a key tactic in the liberation of South Africa from formal Apartheid in 1994.

We expect Skidmore College to participate in the movement for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS). This is a movement against the colonial power known as Israel which is currently occupying Palestine. Part of supporting decolonial BDS efforts includes boycotting products and divesting from relations which contribute to the genocide of Palestinian people living in Occupied Palestine and in the diaspora. 

Below is a non-exhaustive list of demands, which we, the students who pay tuition to attend Skidmore College, are calling for:

1.) Immediate removal of ALL products on Skidmore’s campus which currently contribute to the genocide of Palestinians. This includes the removal of Sabra products from the Burgess cafe, SPA, and the Atrium, an end to Skidmore’s purchasing relationship with HP, severing of all ties with Ben & Jerry’s (which is carried in Burgess Cafe, Atrium Cafe, SPA, and often caters events), and Fanta, Minute-Maid, Hi-C, and Powerade which are all offered in D-HALL. The following is a complete list of products and companies that profit off of colonial occupation in Palestine and should be used as a guideline for which products to remove from campus: http://bdsguide.com/bds-list/. 
2. ) A rejection of the New York 6 Schools’ letter, which condemns the BDS movement in the name of “academic freedom.” 
3.) A new letter, written by President Conner, which displays our support of Palestine and Palestinian resistance via Skidmore’s alignment with the BDS movement. 
4.) An immediate severing of ties with institutions, including speakers, and study abroad programs which take place in Occupied Palestine.  

We want to make a very clear distinction between anti-Zionism and antisemitism. Especially at a time when antisemitic hate crimes are on the rise, it is important to condemn antisemitism and violence against Jewish people and communities and to make it clear that it is possible to condemn colonial violence without engaging in anti-Jewish rhetoric. Many Jewish activist groups, internationally and in the Capital Region, are rallying to condemn the actions of Israeli Occupation forces and to call for the land to be rightfully returned to Palestine so that the 7 million Palestinians who have been expelled from their homeland may return. 

We have penned a letter to Skidmore College President Marc C. Conner, as well as a letter to all the Skidmore professors who have previously pledged their support as "allies" to BIPOC students. If you do not see action from your professors and administrators in the coming days know that they are aware of this movement and are actively choosing silence. Please sign this petition to show your support for BDS at Skidmore College ad your opposition to colonial violence, please contact your advisors, department chairs, professors, and administrators to urge them to sign this petition and pledge their support as well. By attending college at Skidmore and by living in the United States we are all active participants in supporting the violence that has been occurring in Palestine for the past eight decades. Your commitment to divesting from colonial forces is the very least you owe the people of Palestine and colonized peoples across the world.