Campus protests over assassination of Hamas leader continue

Protests have swept across university campuses in several North African countries, including Tunisia, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco and Egypt, since the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh, the head of the political bureau of Hamas, in a 31 July attack in Teheran, Iran, which he was visiting.

In their condemnation of the assassination of Haniyeh, many of the student organisations in North Africa have amplified their calls for an end to the war which has left thousands, Palestinians in particular, dead and displaced, and has also contributed to what has been called a “scholasticide”, which means the destruction of education in the area.

Although the strike on Haniyeh “was widely assumed to have been carried out by Israel”, the country’s government made no claim of responsibility and declined to comment on the killing, Reuters reported earlier.

The assassination came hours after Fuad Shukr, a senior leader of the Iranian-backed Lebanese group Hezbollah, was killed in an Israeli airstrike in Beirut.

Morocco

On 3 August the Morocco-based Organisation of the Student Renaissance, a national association open to all university students in Morocco, became one of several organisations in the country that protested.

In addition, the Moroccan Front to Support Palestine and Oppose Normalisation [of relations with Israel], which includes academics and university students, organised a protest on 31 July condemning the assassination of Haniyeh and the attacks on Gaza.

The National Union of Moroccan Students (Union Nationale des Etudiants du Maroc, or UNEM) which belongs to Morocco’s largest Islamic movement, Al Adl Wal Ihsane (Justice and Charity), has also condemned the event.

Earlier, on 31 July, the National Union of Moroccan Students issued a statement warning of the danger of escalating the conflict in the region.

Mauritania

Also on 3 August, as well as on 31 July, a Mauritania-based student initiative which aims ‘to combat Zionist infiltration’ staged a protest in front of the American embassy in Mauritania.

At the protest, the head of the student initiative, Ahmed Bona, called on Arab and Islamic leaders and the world to urgently take action to end Israel’s siege in Gaza, open crossings and “stop the genocide against Palestinian people”.

He accused Arab regimes of being responsible for what is happening in Gaza in terms of bombing, killing and the displacement of people.

Photos and a video clip of the protest festival were posted on the initiative’s official Facebook page.

Also in Mauritania, Mohammed Yahya Mustafa, the secretary general of the National Union of Mauritanian Students, on 2 August joined mourners and visited Hamas’ office in Mauritania on behalf of members.

Tunisia and Libya

In Tunisia, a march took place on 31 July.

It was organised by a number of parties, including the national executive office of the General Union of Tunisian Students (l’Union Générale des Etudiants de Tunisie), and the National Committee to Support the Resistance in Palestine and Coordination of Joint Action for Palestine in Tunisia, among others.

Furthermore, Libyan youth, including university students, have held a demonstration in the Libyan capital, Tripoli.

The demonstrators continued to call on the international community to take immediate action to protect the human rights of the Palestinian people.

Academic condemnation

Sheikh Ahmed el-Tayeb, the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar, which is the ultimate authority of Al-Azhar University in Egypt, the world’s leading centre for Arabic literature and Sunni Islamic learning and one of the oldest higher education institutions in the world, also condemned the assassination on 31 July.

Several other universities in Palestine issued statements to condemn the assassination, including the Open Quds University in Gaza, AL-Najah National University, Hebron University, Palestine Ahliya University, Modern University College, Palestine Polytechnic University and Birzeit University. Statements were posted on the Facebook pages of these institutions.

Solidarity protests also took place on the campuses of the University of Jordan, the University of Teheran in Iran and Sana’a University in Yemen.

The human cost of the conflict

Israel’s offensive in Gaza has been ongoing since October 2023 after about 1,100 people were killed in an attack by Hamas in Israel during which about 200 hostages were also taken.

According to reports, an estimated 5,432 people are reported to have been injured in the Israeli side so far, while about 38,300 people have been reported killed and 88,241 injured, according to figures from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, which also has stated that there are 1.9 million displaced people in Gaza.

The Palestinian Higher Education Ministry, in a post on Facebook said about 700 students and academics have been killed, about 2,480 injured and damage has been done to about 20 universities.

The impact of the conflict on education has been dubbed a “scholasticide”, by a panel of 18 UN experts.

The term refers to the systemic obliteration of education through the arrest, detention or killing of teachers, students and staff, and the destruction of educational infrastructure.