Newsletter August 2026
Welcome back to a new academic year. As our classes, committees, and other administrative tasks pick up again, the political pressure on management needs to be intensified once more. Over the last 12 months, after much pressure and mobilisation, Leiden management has imposed limited forms of scrutiny on collaborations with Israeli institutions, complicit in the ongoing dispossession and elimination of the Palestinian population. However, it has failed to apply the recommendations of its own committee and has refused to implement a full boycott. Our work is not done.
In the same period, Israeli violence against Palestinians has not abated. Gazans continue to live in inhumane conditions, cramped in camps in less than 50% of the strip, and under regular bombardment. In the West Bank, settler violence, supervised by the Israeli military, has reached unprecedented heights over the summer, while Israeli politicians are leading mass invasions of Palestinian holy sites in Jerusalem. Palestinian Citizens continue to suffer from state neglect in the face of an escalating crime wave and are targeted daily in the context of upcoming Israeli elections. Our work is not done.
LSP therefore calls upon all colleagues to refuse to be made complicit in these crimes, and join us in maintaining pressure on our management to cut all ties with genocide and apartheid. At the same time, we also call on the Leiden community to support the Palestinian committee for Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israeli institutions (PACBI)’s call to impose an ‘Exclusion from below’ - ‘excluding Israel and all its complicit universities from Horizon and other multilateral projects or otherwise boycotting these projects’.
In this newsletter:
- Join the demo at the opening of the academic year
- LSP pre-semester meeting
- Oped Voices of Young Academics Blog
- Start with Silence
- National demonstration in Leiden
- Weekly silent sit-in
- Workshop Larissa Sansour
- Upcoming Events: Calendar
Join the demo at the opening of the academic year
Monday 31 August 14:00-14:45 Spuiplein in front of Amare building
Leiden University will open this academic year with a ceremony in the Hague. Leiden Scholars for Palestine calls upon all lecturers who support a full boycott of complicit Israeli institutions to come to the Hague and remind all attendees of the ceremony that our board’s “more nuanced approach” means continued collaboration with institutions aiding in war crimes, despite the clear advice of its own committee (see section Oped De Jonge Akademie below).
For those of you who have signed up to attend the meeting inside, there will be banners which you can take with you.
Please feel free to reach out to [email protected] if you have any questions or suggestions for Monday the 31st.
LSP pre-semester meeting
Wednesday 2 September 15:15-17:15 Agora 0B.23
Join LSP for a meeting taking stock of where we are now and planning actions and events for the upcoming semester. Those who are frustrated by our university’s inaction, curious about our activities and eager to join the struggle are encouraged to join in. After the meeting there is time to informally meet like-minded colleagues.
Oped Voices of Young Academics Blog
On July 6, four members of the Young Academy Leiden published an oped with a detailed and lucid analysis of the Executive Board’s response to the recommendation of the Committee on Human Rights and Conflict Areas to suspend all collaborations with Israel. They argue that in choosing not to suspend all collaborations with Israeli universities, Leiden University fails to uphold the values of human rights and international justice they claim to defend. The Executive Board’s position acknowledges the gravity of the situation, but declines to act on that acknowledgement. ‘One day, when everyone will have always been against this, which narratives of freedom and justice will Leiden University have to defend its lack of accountability?’
Read the full article here: https://www.voicesyoungacademics.nl/articles/practice-what-you-preach-why-leiden-university-should-suspend-all-collaborations-with-israel
Start with Silence
NO BUSINESS AS USUAL.
We refuse to start another academic year as if nothing is happening. Like last year, we open our first classes with a moment of silence in solidarity with our colleagues in Gaza, the West Bank and Southern Lebanon and as a call for a full boycott. Please download the slides, adjust them as you see fit, and copy them at the beginning of your first lecture slides.
More information on the action: https://leidenscholarsforpalestine.org/start-with-silence-2026/
National demonstration in Leiden
Saturday 26 September 14:00 Lammermarkt Leiden
A coalition of national action groups has called for a national demonstration for boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS). The demonstration takes place in Leiden and starts at 14:00 at the Lammermarkt. Please spread the word and forward these images to your contacts.
Weekly silent sit-in
We will resume our weekly sit-in in front of Rapenburg 70, to stand in solidarity with our Palestinian colleagues and students, who have been bombed, displaced, starved and killed, and whose institutions have been willfully destroyed.
Please note, this term the sit-ins will take place on Tuesdays 12:00-12:30.
Workshop Larissa Sansour
Friday 18 September 9:30-17:00 Amsterdam
Leiden scholars Judith Naeff, Haneen Omari and Martin Berger are involved with the one-day OSL workshop around the exhibition of Palestinian artist Larissa Sansour at the Wereldmuseum Amsterdam, centered around questions of memory, cultural identity, heritage objects and colonialism.
More information and registration: https://www.oslit.nl/heritage-homeland-and-colonial-objects/
