For 2 years, Israel has conducted a campaign of eradication against Palestinians in the Gaza strip, dropping over 2 million pounds of explosives on a heavily populated area only 5 miles wide by 25 miles long. Israel has destroyed every hospital and university in Gaza, targeted medics and journalists, bulldozed homes, and killed children by sniper fire. Throughout this bombardment, which is estimated to have killed over 100,000 people, Israel has carried out an illegal blockade of the Gaza strip, forcing Palestinians into a state of famine.

The University of Houston currently holds investments of over $13 Million in arms manufacturers and other companies that perpetuate occupation, apartheid, and genocide through material aid or resource extraction. In May of this year, university faculty took on a $2.8M research contract developing military drone technology for Northrop Grumman, the manufacturer of the Hellfire Missiles which Israel fires into Palestinian homes; the latest in a long list of multi-million dollar grants which UH has accepted to build new technologies of warfare and surveillance.

UH also has deals with Sabra, Starbucks, Coca-Cola, and a proposed Pizza Hut, companies which prop up the Israeli economy and, in the case of Sabra, directly fund the Israeli military.

This year, UH decided not only to ramp up its feeble attempts to silence Pro-Palestine speech, but agreed to sell out its immigrant community and began collaborating with federal immigration enforcement, announcing its intention to allow ICE agents on campus.

In response, Students for Justice in Palestine declares a hunger strike.

In solidarity with the hunger strikers, I demand that the University of Houston:

1. Divest from companies that perpetuate occupation, apartheid, and genocide.
2. Cancel its research with military contractors.
3. Remove Coca-Cola, Sabra, Starbucks, and Pizza Hut from campus.
4. Refuse to collaborate with federal immigration enforcement and establish itself as a Sanctuary Campus from ICE.