As scholars dedicated to questions of justice and ethics, we believe that Yvette Cooper’s recent proscription of Palestine Action represents an attack both on the entire pro-Palestine movement and on fundamental freedoms of expression, association, assembly, and protest. We deplore the repressive consequences that this ban has already had, and are especially concerned about the likely impact of Cooper’s ban on universities across the UK and beyond.
We therefore applaud the growing campaign of collective defiance that aims to overturn the ban. We commend the courageous stand taken by Defend our Juries, and the exemplary recent motion adopted by Derry and Strabane district council that “supports all those who have protested the ban on Palestine Action and calls for charges against them to be immediately dropped”.
In alliance with thousands of trade unionists, teachers and students throughout the UK and abroad, we affirm our own solidarity with all those who are campaigning against the proscription. We fully share the aim of ending the flow of weapons from Britain to Israel and the belief that all participants in the pro-Palestine movement should be free to make our own decisions about how best to achieve that goal. We remind the UK government that its own most urgent priorities should already be determined by its binding obligation “to prevent and to punish” genocide.
As the organisers of massive national demonstrations face prosecution, as hundreds of people again risk arrest by joining street protests on 9 August, and as students and teachers prepare for the start of another turbulent academic year, we express our full solidarity with those mobilising on their campuses or in their workplaces and communities to put an immediate stop to the escalating genocide and to end all UK complicity with Israel’s crimes.
Gilbert Achcar Emeritus professor of development studies and international relations, Soas University of London
Anne Alexander Senior research associate, Cambridge Digital Humanities, University of Cambridge
Tariq Ali Writer and historian
Sandra Babcock Clinical professor of law, Cornell Law School
Étienne Balibar Professor emeritus of philosophy, University of Paris X, Nanterre
Chetan Bhatt Anthony Giddens professor of social theory, London School of Economics
Wendy Brown UPS Foundation chair, school of social science, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton
Susan Buck-Morss Distinguished professor, CUNY Graduate Centre
Judith Butler Distinguished professor in the graduate school, department of comparative literature, University of California, Berkeley
Alex Callinicos Emeritus professor of European studies, King’s College London
John Chalcraft Professor of Middle East history and politics, London School of Economics
Emilios Christodoulidis Chair of jurisprudence, University of Glasgow
Rebecca Comay Professor of philosophy and comparative literature, University of Toronto
Angela Davis Distinguished professor emerita, University of California, Santa Cruz
Alex de Waal Executive director, World Peace Foundation
Jodi Dean Professor of politics, Hobart and William Smith Colleges, Geneva, New York
Elsa Dorlin Professor of contemporary political philosophy, Université Toulouse Jean Jaurès
Jennifer Doyle Professor of English, University of California, Riverside
Haidar Eid Associate professor of postcolonial literature, Al-Aqsa University, Gaza, Palestine
Roberto Esposito Professor of philosophy, Scuola Normale Superiore, Pisa
John Bellamy Foster Professor emeritus, sociology, University of Oregon
Verónica Gago Professor of social sciences, University of Buenos Aires
Neve Gordon Professor of international law, Queen Mary University of London
Greg Grandin Peter V and C Vann Woodward professor of history, Yale University
Penny Green Professor of law and globalisation, Queen Mary University of London
Peter Hallward Professor of modern European philosophy, Centre for Research in Modern European Philosophy, Kingston University
Michael Hardt Professor of literature, Duke University
Robin DG Kelley Professor of history, University of California, Los Angeles
Rashid Khalidi Edward Said professor emeritus of modern Arab studies, Columbia University
Naomi Klein Associate professor of climate justice, University of British Columbia
Elena Loizidou Professor in law and political theory, Birkbeck, University of London
Frédéric Lordon Research director, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, France
Tracy McNulty Professor of comparative literature and Romance studies, Cornell University
Angela McRobbie Professor emeritus, Goldsmiths, University of London
Sandro Mezzadra Professor of political theory, University of Bologna
China Miéville Salvage
Abdaljawad Omar Assistant professor of philosophy and cultural studies, Birzeit University, Palestine
Ilan Pappé Professor of history and Middle Eastern studies, and director of the European Centre for Palestine Studies, University of Exeter
Paul Patton Emeritus professor of philosophy, University of New South Wales
Bruce Robbins Old Dominion Foundation professor in the humanities, Columbia University
William I Robinson Distinguished professor of sociology, University of California, Santa Barbara
Jacqueline Rose Professor of humanities and co-director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities, University of London
Lynne Segal Professor emerita of psychosocial studies, Birkbeck, University of London
Avi Shlaim Emeritus professor of international relations, St Antony’s College, Oxford
Nikhil Pal Singh Chair, department of social and cultural analysis, New York University
Elettra Stimilli Professor of philosophy, Sapienza Università di Roma
Rei Terada Professor emerita of comparative literature, University of California, Irvine
Enzo Traverso Professor in the humanities, Cornell University
Françoise Vergès Senior research fellow, Sarah Parker Remond Centre for the Study of Racism and Racialisation, University College London
Mara Viveros Vigoya Professor in the faculty of human sciences at Universidad Nacional de Colombia, and Simón Bolívar professor, University of Cambridge, 2024-25
Eyal Weizman Founding director of Forensic Architecture and professor of spatial and visual cultures, Goldsmiths, University of London
Jessica Whyte Scientia associate professor of philosophy, University of New South Wales
