SOAS student expelled for Palestine activism calls out university’s moral collapse

Hello, welcome to People's Dispatch. My name is Vijay Prashad. Um, we're going to talk about the school of oriental and African studies founded in 1916 as the school of oriental studies added the African 20 years later. So, as was set up as a colonial institution um to train colonial administrators to go out there into Africa and Asia and to take care of the natives. That was the um instruction given by the royal charter. But of course times have changed, the students have changed. They want a different kind of world. In fact, for now almost 20 years, the Soaz Students Union has been quite committed to the cause of the Palestinians. In 2005, the SOAS student union um passed a resolution to support the boycott, divestment, and sanctions campaign, the BDS campaign. Students have been on the Palestinian front for a while. Uh and then of course during the genocide there was an encampment and things like that. Today we're going to be talking to Haya Adam who has been um recently expelled from Soaz. She was the she is the president of the Palestine Society at Soaz. No surprise that the expulsion order went against her. Uh hia, welcome to People's Dispatch. >> Hi, thank you for having me. Well, first, why don't you tell me what you were studying in your second year at SOAZ and what you've been reading and learning while you've been at the School of Oriental and African Studies. >> Um, first off, we call it the School of Occupation and Apartheid Studies now given the repression that they've put out on students. Um, but I study law and international relations. Um I think it's a good combination uh especially given what's happening now and the field I would prefer to go into is human rights law. So obviously a very relevant uh degree. We've studied a lot of things um in the year that I've been at SOAS. I've been suspended my entire second year now expelled. Um but most prominently the two sort of thinkers or revolutionary figures that um I speak about the most especially given the context of being in SOASS is France Fenon and Edward Sed um especially with international relations and when you study the Middle East at SOAS there's a big emphasis on orientalism so of course that's where Edward say comes in and his readings and texts and then in order for soas to continue pushing their so-called anti-colonial radical rhetoric. We do learn about people like France Fenon uh especially they kind of put an emphasis on the first chapter concerning violence from the wretched of the earth um in order to show you know sort of the radical spirit of France Fenon and how he navigated during um times when you know Algeria was colonized by the French and his involvement. Um I mention both of them because they're really important of course to learn about but so as tends to teach about these revolutionary thinkers and radical thinkers. Yet when students are take these theories and enforce it into their daily practice they are silenced and they are repressed because we are in the heart of colonialism and these institutions are protected by the British state. the same state that puts out wider oppression through mass arrests uh through silencing those who stand up against genocide. These western institutions, these regimes in the west claim that they are the protector of human rights and democracy and justice and liberation. Yet they are imprisoning and arresting those who actually stand against genocide. and the states that claim they are the protector of human rights are actually funding the massacres we are seeing in Gaza and the settler colonialism we are seeing happening in Palestine now and then in terms of law I think that's where SOAS becomes the most hypocritical because they teach about international law and they're teaching us about you know the genocide convention and all of the Geneva conventions and we know typically international law is a scam because institutions like the UN are watching what's happening in Gaza and they're passing through useless resolutions and these diplomatic gestures and yet nothing is being done. Palestinians are still being murdered on a daily basis. But in the context of SOAS as an institution, you can't claim to be a decolonial institution and teach people about what it means to stand up for your rights and international law and at the same time suspend, discipline and expel them. So it really shows the true hypocrisy of SAS as an institution and they are showing their true nature of how they were built as a colonial institution in the first place. >> I mean the interesting thing is ha you are so articulate so clear so able to bring what you've been reading in the classroom into your daily life. How have the people who've been teaching you, the professors, reacted first to your suspension and now to the expulsion? What has been the reaction from the faculty towards this targeting that you have faced? >> Um, before I answer that question, my mom always taught me something growing up and that's to liberate yourself before teaching others liberation. And that always stuck with me and this is what she's been telling academics at SOAS because unfortunately there's only about two or three very supportive academics. Uh recently there's been more support because of the fact that it's reached an expulsion but throughout the entire year you'll only find maybe two or three academics at most that have been supportive uh of the SAS liberated zone of the students facing disciplinaries like myself. I want to give a shout out to two spec in particular Vana and River who have been very supportive. The professors at SOASS sometimes don't even speak up about what's happening in Palestine enough which is absolutely the bare minimum. Um and you can see that you know Adam Khabib is very clearly has very clearly taken over the institution and academics are very reluctant to speak up which is disappointing and brings me back to what my mom said is these academics have gotten their own degrees to go on and teach others about decolonization about the practice of decolonization and the methods in which you know we are supposed to decolonize our curriculums but ourselves yet they themselves are colonized and aren't liberated. So that's something that sticks with me is my mom always tells them liberate yourselves before teaching others liberation. And I'm quite disappointed to be honest because obviously there's a genocide going on in Gaza. But as an academic, you know, these are your students. You're supposed to back them up especially in times like these because they are facing grave injustices and especially given the so-called rhetoric at SOAS. you chose to teach here and you knew that so is profiting off of this reputation so why aren't you speaking up you know even just the bare minimum of you know criticizing Adam Khadib they're reluctant to do that but imagine if all the staff and all the academics at soas got together imagine the amount of power they would have especially in challenging Adam Habib as the vice chancellor of the university >> you've mentioned Adam Habib I think It's important for people to know that Mr. Hhabib comes as the vice chancellor of the of SOAZ from South Africa. And I mean I just want to share a few things about Mr. Habib. His family for instance um in the early part of the 20th century were the ones who invited Mahatma Gandhi then Mandas K. Gandhi as a young lawyer to come to South Africa to defend their rights against the South African state. His family were the people who actually brought Gandhi to South Africa for a human rights cause. Mr. Khabib was previously the principal at the University of Witzwaterand where he brought the police onto the campus uh to suppress the students in 2016 during the fees must fall protest. I went to see Mr. Habib after that event when he sort of tried to justify what he had done saying that students have the right to study and that you know the the fees must fall students were disrupting uh ability of students to study. By the way he was also um you know uh you know caught up in a scandal where he used racial insult against um people and so on. Had to apologize for that. Mr. Khabib is not standing on firm ice by the way given his own reputation um sort of already insulting the fact that his ancestors brought Gandhi for a human rights cause and here he is expelling you um but let's let's come back to you ha you you have been very involved in the encampment for Palestine and so on lots of students in Britain are deeply moved by what's happening by Britain's role in not only arming um the Israelis in the genocide but also supplying surveillance information from the air base in Cyprus. Uh what has been the reaction of the students to the fact that you have now been expelled from so >> um first of all just a quick note on Adam Habib. I think we can see now how he very much fits into soas's false illusion and anti-colonial false rhetoric that they have especially given the fact that he calls it disruptions but there were injustices happening in South Africa because these tuition fees were very high disproportionately affecting the black students in South Africa and he was brought to crack down on the student movement here as well given now we are seeing what is happening at SOAS um And obviously the fact that he got away with using a very severe racial slur which is absolutely ridiculous and absurd that he got away with it. Um which is why we continue to hold him accountable. I think students have been very angry and rightfully so because I have been saying this. This is not about me. This is not about one individual or one student. What happened is an attack on all of us. It is an attack on our rights to freedom of speech and assembly. This is setting an extremely dangerous precedent for what's to come because now some students may feel that if they speak up this could happen to them. So that's a very dangerous precedent to set and this is not the first time so has done something like this. Recently the University of London granted an injunction on our campus. The University of London owns a lot of land for multiple universities across London and they basically criminalize protests on our own campus and it means that if we were to seek permission sorry if we were not to seek permission and we would go out to protest then we could be contempt of court sanctioned up to two years in prison. And what happened after that? So as said the president Cambridge followed after with a much more severe injunction that covered more than university grounds. So again, I say that students are angry and rightfully so. Um, but it doesn't mean that they're intimidated. It actually means that our conviction is stronger and that students want to fight this repression because this is an attack on our democracy and an attack on all of us. So students are finding ways to challenge this. We are finding ways to challenge this because this cannot stand. And it is our moral responsibility and obligation as students to stand up against genocide because we always say that if management carry blood on their hands because of the fact that they are investing in companies that are funding the Gaza then we as students also have our tuition fees stained in Palestinian blood and this cannot stand. We cannot be bystanders because that means we are complicit as well. Hya, you are such a brave person and so bright. Uh I wish I had a university where I could immediately give you a seat so you could come and study at our university. It's a it's a real uh it's a stain on Soaz that they've decided to expel somebody as bright as you. But what's the next step? Is there a way to appeal this? Are you going to take this to court? What is the next step for you? Well, first of all, thank you so much and it's a pleasure to be here with you as well. So, thank you. Um, obviously I have to appeal the internal sort of university disciplinary procedure and challenge that and then of course there will be legal roots uh in order to challenge this university um because they cannot get away with what they've been doing uh especially the fact that their allegations are completely false. They've alleged things such as harassment, abusive behavior, and operational obstruction. They've alleged these things on the basis of a social media post. A social media post in which I was the voice over criticizing, politically criticizing someone in authority called Safia, a sabbatical officer in the students union who failed to uphold her political manifesto. It is well within my rights, especially my rights uh under articles 10 and 11 of the human rights act to politically criticize anyone in authority. This applies to all of us. So this just shows the authoritarian nature of this institution that if you criticize someone in a high position of authority or management, you warrant a disciplinary, a suspension or now as you can see an expulsion. which means that these people believe that they are above the law. You're allowed to criticize the government. You're allowed to say what you want about Kir Star and the government rightfully so because they are complicit in genocide. But when it comes to our institutions, these people working inside them truly believe they are above the law. Which is why it's imperative that we challenge them um within their own disciplinary procedures which they have broken multiple times especially how they prolong it. They say, "Oh, you've broken the fact that you didn't follow our guidelines." Their guidelines state that every 10 working days they should give an update. Throughout the entire year, sometimes a disciplinary procedure was delayed by one month. So, they have broken their procedures time and time again and they continue to make up these allegations in order to prolong the disciplinary procedure and to try to aim to get what they want. which is why we need to show that we are the majority and that this institution despite the fact that it's protected by the wider British state will not get away with this because the thing they fear the most like what the British state fears the most is the power of the people and the power of the masses because they know that we are the majority. >> I have best of luck with your challenge your internal legal challenge first. I very much hope that you succeed in that and you return as the president of the Palestinian Society and continue doing what you rightfully are able to do. Um, you've been with People's Dispatch. Thank you very much and see you next time. >> Thank you so much. Thank you.