<div dir="ltr">
<h1>An open letter from the presidents of Gaza universities</h1><p class="gmail-article__subhead"><em>Our campuses may have been razed, but our universities continue to exist.</em></p><div class="gmail-article-info-block gmail-opinion-info-block"><div class="gmail-article-b-l"><div class="gmail-article-author-name"><span class="gmail-article-by">By </span><span class="gmail-article-author-name-item"><a class="gmail-author-link" href="https://www.aljazeera.com/author/ayman-sobh">Ayman Sobh</a><span>, </span></span><span class="gmail-article-author-name-item"><a class="gmail-author-link" href="https://www.aljazeera.com/author/omar-milad">Omar Milad</a><span><span> </span>and<span> </span></span></span><span class="gmail-article-author-name-item"><a class="gmail-author-link" href="https://www.aljazeera.com/author/asad-asaad">Asad Asaad</a></span></div><div class="gmail-article-dates"><div class="gmail-date-simple"><span class="gmail-screen-reader-text">Published On 14 Jul 2025 - </span><font size="1"><a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2025/7/14/an-open-letter-from-the-presidents-of-gaza-universities">https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2025/7/14/an-open-letter-from-the-presidents-of-gaza-universities</a></font></div></div></div><div class="gmail-social-share-buttons"><div class="gmail-update-reading-list"></div></div></div><div class="gmail-update-reading-list"><span class="gmail-update-reading-list__tooltip" role="tooltip"></span></div><a class="gmail-social-share-button" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" aria-label="Share on Facebook" href="https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Faje.io%2F66loh2"></a><a class="gmail-social-share-button" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" aria-label="Share on Twitter" href="https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?text=An%20open%20letter%20from%20the%20presidents%20of%20Gaza%20universities&source=sharethiscom&related=sharethis&via=AJEnglish&url=https%3A%2F%2Faje.io%2F66loh2"></a><a class="gmail-social-share-button gmail-copylink" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" aria-label="Copy link" href="https://aje.io/66loh2"></a><div class="gmail-responsive-image"><img src="https://www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/2025-04-15T101844Z_1530213806_RC2QVDALG7NP_RTRMADP_3_ISRAEL-PALESTINIANS-GAZA-DISPLACED-1744745617.jpg?resize=770%2C513&quality=80" alt="Destroyed Gaza university" width="467" height="311" style="margin-right: 25px;"></div>Displaced
Palestinian amputee Mervat al-Bassiouny shelters inside a building at
the Islamic University of Gaza, from which she graduated and which was
destroyed by the Israeli army in Gaza City on April 11, 2025 [File:
Mahmoud Issa/Reuters]<div class="gmail-wysiwyg gmail-wysiwyg--all-content"><p>We,
the presidents of Gaza\u2019s three non-profit universities\u2014 Al-Aqsa
University, Al-Azhar University-Gaza, and the Islamic University of Gaza
\u2014 together accounting for the vast majority of Gaza\u2019s students and
faculty members, issue this unified statement to the international
academic community at a time of unprecedented devastation of higher
education in Gaza.</p><p>Israel\u2019s ongoing genocidal war has brought about scholasticide\u2014a
systematic and deliberate attempt to eliminate our universities, their
infrastructure, faculty, and students. This destruction is not
collateral; it is part of a targeted effort to eradicate the foundations
of higher education in Gaza\u2014foundations that have long stood as pillars
of resilience, hope, and intellectual freedom under conditions of
occupation and siege. While academic institutions across Palestine have
faced attacks for decades, what we are witnessing today is an
escalation: a shift from repeated acts of destruction to an attempt at
total annihilation.</p></div><p>Yet, we remain resolute. For more than a year, we have mobilised and
taken steps to resist this assault and ensure that our universities
endure.</p>
<p>Despite the physical obliteration of campuses, laboratories,
libraries, and other facilities, and the assassination of our students
and colleagues, our universities continue to exist. We are more than
buildings \u2014 we are academic communities, comprised of students, faculty,
and staff, still alive and determined to carry forward our mission.</p>
<p>As articulated in the Unified Emergency <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2024/5/29/open-letter-by-gaza-academics-and-university-administrators-to-the-world">Statement</a>
from Palestinian Academics and Administrators issued on May 29, 2024,
\u201cIsraeli occupation forces have demolished our buildings, but our
universities live on.\u201d</p>
<p>For over a year, our faculty, staff and students have persisted in
our core mission \u2014 teaching \u2014 under unimaginably harsh conditions.
Constant bombardment, starvation, restrictions on internet access,
unstable electricity, and the ongoing horrors of genocide have not
broken our will. We are still here, still teaching, and still committed
to the future of education in Gaza.</p>
<p>We urgently call on our colleagues around the world to work for:</p>
<ul><li>A sustainable and lasting ceasefire, without which no education
system can thrive, and an end to all complicity with this genocide.</li><li>Immediate international mobilisation to support and protect Gaza\u2019s
higher education institutions as vital to the survival and long-term
future of the Palestinian people.</li><li>Recognition of scholasticide as a systematic war on education, and
the necessity of coordinated and strategic international support in
partnership with our universities for the resilience and rebuilding of
our academic infrastructure and communities.</li></ul>
<p>We appeal to the international academic community \u2014 our colleagues, institutions, and friends \u2014 to:</p>
<ul><li>Support our efforts to continue teaching and conducting research, under siege and amidst loss.</li><li>Commit to the long-term rebuilding of Gaza\u2019s universities in
partnership with us, respecting our institutional autonomy and academic
agency.</li><li>Work in partnership with us. Engage directly with and support the
very institutions that continue to embody academic life and collective
intellectual resistance in Gaza.</li></ul>
<p>Last year, we formally established the Emergency Committee of the
Universities in Gaza, representing our three institutions and affiliated
colleges \u2014 together enrolling between 80 and 85 percent of Gaza
universities\u2019 students. The committee exists to resist the erasure of
our universities and offer a unified voice for Gaza\u2019s academic
community. It has since established subject-focused subcommittees to
serve as trusted and coordinated channels for support.</p>
<p>We call upon academic communities around the world to coordinate
themselves in response to this call. The time for symbolic solidarity
has passed. We now ask for practical, structured, and enduring
partnership.</p><div id="gmail-article-newsletter-slot"></div>
<p>Work alongside us to ensure that Gaza\u2019s universities live on and remain a vital part of our collective future.</p>
<br></div>