Statement Concerning the Scholasticide in Gaza

A growing number of scholars of genocide and international law, non-governmental human rights organizations (e.g., B’tselem and Amnesty International) and UN experts have come to the conclusion that the acts of the state of Israel against the Palestinian people of Gaza meet the definition of genocide as stipulated in the United Nations Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. According to the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza as of 31 August more than 63,000 Palestinians were confirmed to have been killed, including 18,430 children, and more than 160,000 injured since the massacre of Israeli and foreign nationals, and the hostage taking, of 7 October 2023 perpetrated by Hamas and other Palestinian factions (1).

As a scholarly association, we are very concerned about the suffering of Palestinian scholars, teachers, and students as well as the destruction of education. Already in April 2024, UN experts expressed “grave concern over the pattern of attacks on schools, universities, teachers, and students in the Gaza Strip” including “the killing of 261 teachers and 95 university professors […] which may constitute an intentional effort to comprehensively destroy the Palestinian education system, an action known as scholasticide.” (2)

The bases for this charge included in April 2024:

• The Israel Defense Forces’ (IDF) destruction of 80 percent of schools in Gaza, leaving 625,000 children with no educational access;
• The IDF’s destruction of all 12 Gaza university campuses;
• The IDF’s destruction of Gaza’s archives, libraries, cultural centers, museums, and bookstores, including 195 heritage sites, 227 mosques, three churches, and the al-Aqsa University library, which preserved crucial documents and other materials related to the history and culture of Gaza;
• The IDF’s repeated violent displacements of Gaza’s people, leading to the irreplaceable loss of students’ and teachers’ educational and research materials, which will extinguish the future study of Palestinian history

Since the UN’s warning in April 2024, the ongoing campaign of the IDF in Gaza, beyond causing massive death and injury to Palestinian civilians and the collapse of basic life structures, has effectively obliterated Gaza’s education system.

In addition, looting and damaging of educational facilities by Israeli settlers and military in other parts of the Occupied Palestinian Territory (Westbank including East Jerusalem) have intensified to an unprecedented degree, including the targeting of staff and students through abduction, abuse and killing.

In light of the above, be it resolved that

1. The European Association for the Study of Religions (EASR) condemns the violence perpetrated by the state of Israel in Gaza and other parts of the Occupied Palestinian Territory that undermines among others the right to freely teach and learn. In line with international law (3), the EASR calls for a permanent ceasefire and the end of the illegal occupation of the Palestinian Territory in order to halt the scholasticide.
2. The EASR will donate 2000 € to the Friends of Birzeit University (FOBZU), a UK based charity dedicated to public education in the Occupied Palestinian Territory. If they so wish, national associations are encouraged to make their own donations to FOBZU (4).

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(1) See the United Nations’ Unified Health Dashboard on Palestinian Casualties. The figures of the Ministry of Health in Gaza are seen as reliable for war time deaths and are being used by UN agencies and independent experts.

(2) Press release of OHCHR from 18 April 2024.

(3) Most notably, the International Court of Justice’s Advisory Opinion of 19 July 2024 on the “Legal
Consequences Arising From the Policies and Practices of Israel in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Including East Jerusalem and the court’s order concerning the Application of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in the Gaza Strip (South Africa v. Israel).

(4) FOBZU has long-standing experience with transparently administering donations and forwarding them to institutions in the Palestinian Territory.