Beaten, doxxed, threatened, arrested, and suspended, college students learned from past movements to put their bodies on the line for Gaza.
Most media coverage of the spring 2024 student protests for a free Palestine misses the most important element: hope.
Students hope to bring greater attention to Israel’s war on Gaza. They hope to highlight their universities’ complicity with Israeli colonialism. And, in spite of the brutal police responses, they hope to inspire their fellow students.
They have succeeded wildly by capturing the world’s attention and sparking a youth movement that has gone global. Their calls for universities to divest from Israel have revived the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement modeled on the campaign that helped topple South African apartheid. And, as student protests swelled, President Joe Biden for the first time delayed sending 3,500 bombs to Israel after authorizing more than 100…