USyd has Finally Cut an Exchange with Israel, Why Can’t UTS do the Same?

After over a year of pro-Palestinian activism through collective student and staff pressure, USyd Students Against War (SAW) secured confirmation from university management that the exchange partnership with the Israeli Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design will not be reinstated. 

In an email sent on behalf of Professor Lisa Adkins, the Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (FASS), it was confirmed that, "we [Sydney University] recently informed Bezalel Academy that we do not intend to renew our exchange program agreement with them." This decision is a shift in the university's position and is a notable victory for the Palestinian solidarity movement, as it reflects growing institutional recognition of the concerns surrounding Israel’s policies. The Bezalel Academy has faced substantial criticism for its complicity in Israel's apartheid and genocide—actions that have been formally acknowledged by the International Court of Justice (ICJ). Furthermore, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is currently subject to an arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in relation to these crimes.

Just like USyd, UTS is also deeply connected in its ties to the ongoing genocide in Gaza. Students & staff have been strongly and collectively campaigning to cut ties with the Israel Institution of Technology (Technion) after receiving a Freedom of Information (FOI) document exposing the partnership with UTS at the beginning of 2024.

Technion is an institution that has been a crucial military-scientific centre for the state of Israel since 1948. It is tightly affixed to the Israeli military and weapons industry, playing a key role in Israel's ongoing genocide in Gaza and the perpetuation of its apartheid regime.

In the FOI document, it stated that only 8 active students went to Israel on an “unknown” Technion global short course program back in 2019, 2 students virtually in 2020, and only 1 student in 2022. The FOI also states clearly that there is active research collaboration with Technion, particularly research led by the faculty of science. Yet, UTS is still maintaining this unpopular program which involves cooperating with and investing in an institution that is central to an apartheid state. 

This refusal to sever ties with Israel and Technion echoes the broader foreign policy stance of the Australian government, which has long collaborated with Western imperialist powers in conflicts—from the Vietnam War to Iraq, and now in West Papua. Australia's alliance with the U.S. enables Israel’s actions against Palestinians, while the AUKUS pact with the U.S. and U.K. further entrenches the country's ties to imperialist powers. 

Meanwhile, the Australian government allocates $368 billion of taxpayer money to nuclear submarines and expanded military bases for B-52 bombers, intensifying the risk of conflict with China and reshaping universities to fuel the nuclear workforce needed for the looming war.

Instead of squandering $368 billion on fueling the war, Australia could have used that money to build thousands of homes, address the rental crisis that the government blames on immigrants, or increase pay for nurses, teachers, and train drivers. This spending benefits only those who profit from war, which is why we must end the militarisation of our universities and sever ties with Israel.

UTS keeping the Technion cooperation while preparing to reduce $100 million from its budget, merge faculties, cut courses, and engage in mass layoffs, is notably egregious and reflective of the national government’s mismanagement.

Shockingly, a year has passed since the president of the UTS Student Association called on UTS management to review and sever ties with Israeli institutions. Despite this, and the introduction of a BDS motion, UTS management continues to ignore the student representatives elected to advocate for the severance of ties with an apartheid regime responsible for genocide.

The USyd Bezalel exchange program is the only university tie to Israel that has been cut in NSW, and the second uni tie to be cut in Australia. The success of the USyd campaign was driven by collective action, not closed-door negotiations with management. Students and staff publicly exposed the university’s ties to Bezalel, gathered over 200 signatures on a petition demanding an end to the partnership, protested at the SCA graduation show, and organised a “liberation working bee” at Sydney College of the Arts. 

And they achieved all this in open defiance of Sydney Uni’s repressive anti-free speech and anti-protest policies.

USyd student and Students Against War (SAW) member, Angus Dermody, states, “USyd cancelling the exchange with Bezalel demonstrates the power of staff and students when we organise and protest our university’s complicity in genocide and apartheid. We will continue to fight to sever all ties with Israel, including the exchange programs USyd has with other Israeli institutions like the Technion and Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJ). If USyd can cancel the exchange with Bezalel, it can cancel exchanges with Technion and HUJ as well.”

Similarly at UTS, students and staff are coming together to form a united front to sever ties with apartheid Israeli institutions like Technion, aiming to replicate the success of USyd's victorious campaign against Bezalel. Solidarity groups, including the UTS Students Association, Students Against War, Solidarity and National Union of Students, and the NTEUare leading this charge.

We, the students and staff collective, are demanding Albanese and Labor immediately sanction Israel and that universities cut all ties with apartheid Israel, end the repression of Palestine protests on campus, and for the government to fund education, not war. If USyd can cancel the exchange with Bezalel, then UTS can cancel the partnership with Technion. USyd Bezalel First, UTS Technion Next.