Genocide,neutrality and the university sector

Abstract

The ongoing destruction in Gaza demands urgent academic and ethical reckoning, exposing the complicity of universities and scholarly disciplines in sustaining settler-colonial violence. This essay interrogates the role of Sociology as a discipline and academic institutions in shaping, legitimising, or resisting systemic oppression, with a focus on institutional neutrality as a mechanism of erasure. Drawing on critical scholarship on settler colonialism, anti-Palestinian racism and neoliberal academia, the article examines how universities suppress Palestine advocacy through overt repression, bureaucratic silencing and material entanglements with the military-industrial complex. It critiques the discourse of neutrality and balance, demonstrating how these frameworks function to maintain dominant power structures. By tracing the complicity of Western academic institutions – from their partnerships with Israeli military research to their suppression of pro-Palestinian activism – the article argues that meaningful decolonisation requires a rejection of performative neutrality and an active dismantling of structures that sustain occupation and genocide.

The devastation in Gaza unfolds as images of destruction and death flood the media, yet the depth of suffering extends far beyond what cameras or statistics can capture. The loss of life, the enduring trauma, and the collective wounds inflicted on an entire people are not incidental – they are systemic and deliberate, rooted in the logics of settler colonialism, anti-Palestinian racism and global complicity (El-Shewy et al., 2025; Hanieh, 2024; Salamanca et al., 2012). In the face of unimaginable calculated cruelty unleashed by Israel and its state sponsors, even those who have endured decades of Israel’s colonial violence find the current moment unbearable.

The genocide in Gaza demands a critical reckoning with the role of Sociology as a discipline and the broader purpose of academic institutions. What kind of knowledge does the discipline produce, and to whose benefit? Sociology as a discipline has long grappled with the ways systems of domination and resistance intersect – the Palestinian experience is a profound example of how colonial histories and contemporary geopolitics interact to produce enduring social injustice. As Sabbagh-Khoury (2024) has argued, this is ‘a moment for sociology to challenge the exceptionalism of Palestine regarding freedom of speech and to retrace the roots of European modernity, including its ramifications leading to the attempted eradication of European Jewry and subsequently the mass displacement of the Palestinian people’.

This moment forces a re-evaluation of the oft-invoked commitments to decolonisation, as the silence of disciplinary departments and journals in the face of genocide exposes these narratives as performative at best. Such silence is not neutral; it reflects alignment with settler-colonial logics that erase Palestinian lives and struggles, while masking complicity under the guise of institutional detachment.

Indeed, both silence and claims to institutional neutrality are important mechanisms for maintaining the status quo, an evasion of responsibility that enables institutions to profit from and perpetuate the systems of violence they should seek to critique. The evocation of neutrality not only insulates the university, as an entity supposedly ‘above society’, detached from its moral and political responsibilities, but also facilitates the erasure of Palestinian narratives.

Said (1984) presciently warned of this danger, describing a ‘disciplinary communications apparatus’ that suppresses critiques of Israel and silences dissenting voices. Said (1984) emphasised the need to tell the Palestinian story ‘as insistently as possible’, lest it disappear entirely from public consciousness (p. 30). Central to this erasure is anti-Palestinian racism, which operates through the dehumanisation of Palestinians, framing them as dangerous, irrational and undeserving of justice. This racism positions Palestinian narratives as inherently controversial or illegitimate, effectively excluding them from acceptable discourse. Within academic spaces, this manifests in the framing of Palestinian experiences as ‘divisive’ or excessively political, requiring erasure to maintain institutional harmony.

Pro-Palestinian activism and scholarship on university campuses have faced both overt repression and more insidious bureaucratic barriers. Examples abound: students and faculty have been surveilled, subjected to disciplinary actions, or even expelled under the guise of maintaining ‘order’. An investigation by Liberty Investigates (2024), a UK-based human rights organisation, revealed that over 20 universities have shared intelligence with police on pro-Palestinian student organisers, including reporting students to authorities for their social media activity. Across North American and European campuses, encampments highlighting the genocide in Gaza – spaces of symbolic resistance – have been forcibly dismantled, often with police involvement (Hodali, 2024). Universities also turned to legal action to suppress encampments. For example, the High Court and County Court granted possession orders to the Universities of Birmingham, Nottingham and LSE against student encampments, while similar measures were taken by Queen Mary University of London (QMUL) and the University of Bristol (British Society for Middle Eastern Studies [BRISMES], 2024). These aggressive tactics demonstrate how universities perceive Palestine advocacy as destabilising and dangerous, using the guise of ‘safety’ to delegitimise activism.

Simultaneously, softer mechanisms of repression work through bureaucratic hurdles and performative dialogue, discrediting dissent by framing it as out of bounds or inappropriate. These tactics operate in tandem with overt coercion, creating an environment where dissent is both actively repressed and subtly discredited. Together, they reinforce the marginalisation of Palestinian voices while masking institutional complicity with military and state structures.

Neutrality as a colonial construct

Neutrality, as invoked by universities and disciplines, is not an impartial or universal stance but a strategic construct that operates within broader liberal frameworks of recognition and representation, ultimately reinforcing existing power structures. In presenting themselves as neutral arbiters, universities claim to be inclusive and to recognise all voices equally. However, this purported neutrality is embedded within a system of recognition that selectively validates certain narratives – those that align with the dominant political and ideological order – while marginalising others, particularly those challenging the status quo.

As Coulthard (2014) argues in Red Skin, White Masks, liberal frameworks of recognition function to perpetuate settler colonialism by compelling Indigenous peoples to seek validation within structures that are inherently designed to sustain their dispossession. Similarly, Tuck and Yang’s (2012) critique in ‘Decolonization is Not a Metaphor’ underscores how the language of decolonisation can be used to replace meaningful structural change with symbolic gestures that mask the material realities of settler colonialism. In the context of Palestine, the veneer of neutrality and recognition helps to obscure institutional complicity in global systems of oppression, including colonial violence, capitalism and the military-industrial complex.

By casting itself as detached, the university insulates itself from moral accountability while implicitly endorsing the colonial order. In this way, the university’s claim to neutrality operates as both a political choice and a mechanism for maintaining the status quo, where dissent is framed as disruptive rather than a necessary part of transformative enquiry. To claim neutrality in the face of Gaza’s destruction is not merely an evasion but an active affirmation of the ideologies that enable such settler-colonial violence. It reinforces the structural hierarchies that dehumanise Palestinians, presenting their struggle for liberation as an unacceptable deviation from the norms of academic discourse.

This myth of neutrality becomes particularly glaring when juxtaposed against institutional responses to other wars. For instance, the near-immediate support expressed by many Western universities for Ukraine following Russia’s invasion demonstrates that neutrality is selectively applied. Statements of solidarity, scholarship programmes and public condemnations flowed freely in defence of Ukrainian sovereignty. Yet, when the destruction of Gaza fills the news, including the flattening of entire university campuses, these same institutions invoke neutrality as a justification for their silence. This double standard is not merely a coincidence: it reflects the underlying power dynamics and geopolitical alignments that shape institutional priorities. Neutrality, in these instances, although projected as a marker of liberal consistency, is a political choice informed by which narratives and populations are deemed worthy.

Complicity and the arms trade

This complicity goes beyond the realm of discourse, seeping into the very operational fabric of universities. Material relationships with the military-industrial complex reveal the extent of this entanglement. Partnerships with defence contractors, joint research projects with Israeli institutions directly implicated in the occupation, and investments in corporations that manufacture weapons used in Gaza provide glaring examples (Palestine Solidarity Campaign [PSC], 2024).

For Palestinians, these connections are far from theoretical abstractions. Israeli universities, often celebrated as champions of academic freedom, are deeply enmeshed in the settler-colonial project. These institutions conduct research that underpins military operations, develop technologies deployed in the occupation, and are themselves constructed on stolen Palestinian land. When Western universities maintain partnerships with such entities, they entrench themselves in the mechanisms of colonial violence (Wind, 2024).

This complicity extends further. Many Western universities collaborate with military contractors, filling critical gaps in research and development for advanced weapons systems. These systems often find their testing ground in wars, including those targeting Palestinians. For example, institutions like Sheffield University, Southampton University and Imperial College London maintain research partnerships with major arms manufacturers such as Boeing, Raytheon and Thales – companies that directly supply the Israeli military (Workers in Palestine, 2024, p. 6). From contributing to the development of F-35 fighter jet components to advancing autonomous military technologies, these universities actively support the creation of weapons used in Gaza’s destruction. ¹

Such collaborations not only accelerate weapons development but also allow defence companies to mask their roles in perpetuating military violence. By aligning with academic institutions, these corporations present themselves as patrons of education, effectively sanitising their public image and channelling graduates into their ranks. This symbiotic relationship further underscores the depth of universities’ embeddedness within the military-industrial complex.

In this context, the notion of neutrality becomes untenable. These are not passive or apolitical institutions; they are active participants in sustaining the structures of militarism and erasure. The discipline of Sociology itself has been an important space to analyse and critique the deepening connections between universities and the military-industrial complex. Yet, critique alone is insufficient; it must be accompanied by organised efforts to map out, expose and sever these relationships, which are often deliberately obfuscated through complex financial arrangements and institutional opacity. The entanglements between universities, defence contractors and states are shrouded in layers of bureaucracy and confidential agreements, making them challenging to uncover. Systematic research and activism are needed to confront these structures and challenge them.

Bureaucracy, surveillance and silencing tactics

As education becomes more market-driven and reliant on corporate funding, universities increasingly use bureaucratic mechanisms to suppress dissent and reinforce their complicity. Policies like the UK’s Prevent programme, which mandates that universities monitor and report students or staff who display behaviours that may indicate they are at risk of radicalisation – often based on vague or broad criteria – along with internal bureaucratic procedures, target pro-Palestinian organising, turning simple acts of advocacy into high-stakes challenges (Malak, 2019). The result is a chilling effect on political expression, where universities actively discourage the kind of critical engagement necessary for exposing and confronting their own role in maintaining the status quo.

Risk assessments are applied disproportionately to Palestine-related events, turning simple events into bureaucratic obstacles that require navigating a maze of approvals, fees and excessive security measures. By cloaking these restrictions in the language of neutral bureaucratic procedure, universities effectively suppress activism, ensuring that contentious issues are kept out of public view. This systematic depoliticisation erodes the university’s supposed mission as a space for open debate, reducing it instead to a carefully controlled environment that prioritises institutional reputation over meaningful dialogue or debate.

Bureaucratic silencing tools are wielded with finesse, drowning out voices in a sea of paperwork. Forms to fill, managers to convince, committees to navigate. Events meant to shed light on the history and politics of Palestine are buried in committees, all taking precious time and energy from organisers, who must divert their focus from fostering meaningful discussions to untangling procedural red tape. While universities often justify these measures as necessary to ensure safety, they fail to acknowledge that it is predominantly Palestinian narratives that are deemed ‘unsafe’ or, in risk assessment language, ‘controversial’. This reveals a stark power imbalance, where the rhetoric of safety is weaponised to suppress one particular perspective.

This suppression reflects a broader neoliberal transformation of the university, where institutional priorities revolve around compliance, profitability and reputation management. By framing dissent as a liability, universities undermine their role as spaces for critical engagement and reinforce the structures of power they claim to oppose. Restricting campus space and imposing codes of conduct resonate with a view of students as customers paying for a service in the context of a neoliberal university, rather than as active participants in the politics that shape the world around them. As Nadeau and Sears have argued,

. . . the goal of neoliberalism in post-secondary education is to make the universities serve exclusively economic goals, preparing students for the corporate workplace and creating know-how that can be commercialised. This requires a serious culture shift on campuses. One of the core political projects of neoliberalism on campus has been to roll back the spaces for campus activism and freedom of expression originally won by student militancy in the 1960s and 1970s. (Nadeau & Sears, 2011)

In such a climate, activism – particularly activism that challenges dominant narratives – becomes a liability that threatens the institution’s image and its connections to powerful state and corporate partners. The repression of Palestine advocacy is not an isolated act: it is part of a broader pattern of silencing dissent, one that will increasingly define the academic landscape as corporate entanglements deepen.

Balance, dialogue and the illusion of neutral mediation

The discourse of neutrality often intersects with calls for ‘balance’ and ‘dialogue’, which may appear benign, but serve to maintain existing power dynamics. The emphasis on balance relies on a misleading premise: that the Palestinian struggle is a conflict between two relatively equal parties, both with legitimate grievances, that can be mediated through dialogue. This framing is deeply problematic. It abstracts the issue from its historical and political context, reducing it to a cultural or interpersonal dispute. The Palestinian struggle is not simply a disagreement between two communities: it is a struggle against settler colonialism, systemic dispossession and state-sanctioned violence. By ignoring these dynamics, calls for balance and dialogue present a distorted picture of the situation, effectively erasing the structural realities that define it.

Such frameworks also impose conditions that inherently disadvantage Palestinian narratives. The expectation of balance assumes that both ‘sides’ of the issue are equally represented and equally deserving of space in academic discourse. Yet in practice, institutional and state-backed support overwhelmingly favours Israel, while Palestinian voices are frequently marginalised, silenced or delegitimised. For instance, demands for balance often translate into requirements that Palestine solidarity events include speakers who support Israel, placing an undue burden on organisers and reframing the issue as one of competing opinions rather than systemic oppression.

The focus on balance and dialogue also serves to obscure the complicity of universities in sustaining the structures of oppression they claim to mediate. As noted earlier, many universities maintain financial and institutional ties to the military-industrial complex, including partnerships with defence contractors and Israeli institutions implicated in the occupation. By promoting dialogue as a solution, universities deflect attention from their material entanglements, shifting the burden onto individuals and communities.

Ultimately, these frameworks of balance and dialogue function as tools of depoliticisation. They create an illusion of neutrality. Far from addressing the injustices, they serve to maintain the status quo, ensuring that meaningful activism is stifled and institutions remain unaccountable. Calls for balance and dialogue are not apolitical: they are deeply embedded in the same systems of erasure and complicity that characterise the broader discourse of neutrality in academic spaces.

Beyond neutrality, ending complicity

As universities in Gaza lie in ruins, the unwavering efforts of academics, students and staff in these institutions remind us that education is far more than physical infrastructure. These institutions are communities of resistance, critical enquiry and hope, persevering even under the most brutal conditions. Palestinian educators and scholars are continuing their work amidst unimaginable challenges. Workers in Palestine, a collective of Palestinian trade unions, including all academic unions, has called for their counterparts internationally to consider their own role in sustaining Israel’s militarism and to question military research within their institutions. This is no easy task in a climate of silencing, but it is one that must be taken seriously.

To answer this call, Sociology as a discipline must confront its role in perpetuating the very structures it seeks to critique, refusing to remain detached or merely descriptive in its approach. This requires a radical rethinking of methods and priorities. Sociology’s tools and frameworks should be wielded to expose and dismantle systems of oppression, rather than neutralising or legitimising them.

In practical terms, this means that sociologists must critically assess their own institutional affiliations, challenge the complicity of academic spaces in perpetuating harm, and advocate for a redistribution of resources that prioritises communities fighting for justice. It also means moving beyond abstract critiques of power to direct sustained action and engagement with Palestinian communities and academic institutions.

Neutrality, as this essay has demonstrated, is not apolitical; it is a mechanism that perpetuates colonial violence and shields institutions from accountability. The extensive partnerships between universities and defence contractors, as well as collaborations with institutions complicit in military occupation, underscore the depths of this entanglement. Dismantling these ties is not just a matter of ethics – it is a necessary step to reclaim the university as a space for genuine critique, transformative enquiry, and meaningful engagement with struggles for justice.