Discussing the war in Gaza is off limits with two of its Israeli partner universities, says Tilburg University. For this reason, the university has decided to cancel its ties with them. However, researchers at Tilburg will still be permitted to collaborate with researchers on an individual basis. This monday, the Executive Board of Radboud University will announce its intended decision regarding the collaboration with Israeli universities.

In December, Tilburg University’s Executive Board was advised to terminate its ‘institutional ties’ with three Israeli universities. Following this announcement, things remained quiet for months. At least, the board remained silent. In the meantime, pro-Palestinian demonstrations at the university continued.

Now it turns out that the board was working on the issue behind the scenes: Tilburg sought to open a dialogue with three Israeli partner institutions to hear their side of the story. In two cases this proved to be unsuccessful, the board writes in a press release published on Wednesday.

Symbolic

“It was not possible to have a dialogue about the risks involved in collaboration”, the board writes. Its aim was to address the matter of “systematic and gross violations of human rights and fundamental freedoms” in the country.

Tilburg University is therefore cutting its ties with Reichman University, a smaller private institution near Tel Aviv, and with Bar Ilan University, a large public university in the same city.

The decision is mainly symbolic. As Tilburg University magazine Univers reports, students had already stopped going on exchanges to Israel because the government advised against travelling there. Meanwhile, researchers at the university are still permitted to work with individual researchers in Israel. Israeli students are also still welcome in Brabant.

Hebrew University

In December, the Advisory Committee on Inter-institutional Partnerships found that the Brabant-based university has a “moral responsibility to take action” in response to the Israeli offensive that followed the Hamas attack on Israeli civilians in October 2023. Israeli bombings have caused vast numbers of civilian casualties and the Israeli authorities are barely allowing any aid into Gaza. Since last Wednesday, the Dutch government has also reports, the position that this should have consequences for cooperation with Israel.

Tilburg is not the only Dutch university reconsidering its collaboration with Israeli institutions. The University of Amsterdam cut ties with Jerusalem’s Hebrew University after an internal committee concluded that the institution is too closely linked to the Israeli military.

However, Tilburg’s Executive Board reached a different conclusion, describing Hebrew University as the only one of its three partners with whom dialogue was possible. “This university gave us the impression of being critical and for that reason we are continuing our dialogue for the time being.” Tilburg hopes it can “exert an influence” by keeping the channels of communication open.

Bitten by dog

This Monday, the Executive Board of Radboud University will announce whether it will follow the advice of the Advisory Committee on Inter-institutional Partnerships to cut ties with Tel Aviv University and the Hebrew University. A pro-Palestinian demonstration caused major unrest on the Nijmegen campus just yesterday. After several demonstrators entered the Berchmanianum, three arrests followed an hour later on Heyendaalseweg.

During the police intervention, one of the demonstrators was bitten in the leg by a police dog. The Nijmegen branches of PvdA, GroenLinks, SP, and Partij voor de Dieren have announced that they will raise questions about the incident with the mayor during the next city council meeting.