After months of silence, a major pro-Palestine protest returns to the UvA
For the first time this academic year, another large pro-Palestinian protest took place. A long march went from Roeterseiland to the Maagdenhuis. Protesters demanded – once again – that the UvA calls the situation in Gaza genocide and severs all ties with Israeli institutions.
Around three hundred protesters gathered on Monday afternoon on the bridge of the Roeterseiland Campus to urge the University of Amsterdam to speak out about the situation in Gaza. They then marched in a large procession past the New University Library to the Maagdenhuis.
The atmosphere at the first major demonstration of this academic year was completely different from that during the protests in 2025: no occupations, no face coverings and a combative but friendly atmosphere. Whereas in 2024, after vandalism at the university, demonstrators could expect angry reactions, on Monday afternoon, bystanders cheered and clapped enthusiastically.
Action group Amsterdam Encampment, organiser of the demonstration, calls on the UvA to officially call the war in Gaza genocide. The demonstrators also reiterated that the UvA’s collaborations with Israeli institutions must be severed. Amsterdam Encampment cited the Israeli army’s arrest of an activist fleet with Dutch nationals on board en route to Gaza as the immediate cause for the protest.
“Genocidal violence”
According to the protesters, the University of Amsterdam should call the Dutch government to account for doing too little about the current situation in Gaza. “The UvA must call what is happening in Gaza what it is: a genocide,” says UvA student and organiser Hidde Heijnis. Heijnis hopes that if universities were to call the current situation genocide, this would put pressure on the Dutch government. “We must protest wherever we can: at work, at university, at our university.” If the university calls what is happening in Gaza genocide, Heijnis believes this will trickle up.
The UvA previously called the situation in Gaza “genocide”, but a few days later, rector Peter-Paul Verbeek told Folia that this was a mistake. According to the official UvA line, there is at most “genocidal violence”, Verbeek said. The UvA administrator said he was basing his opinion on NIOD researchers, although NIOD scientist Ugur Ümit Üngör stated in Folia that there is no difference between genocide and genocidal violence.
Step to the European Commission
Many demonstrators at the protest also called for an end to cooperation with Israeli institutions. They are particularly opposed to the ten research collaborations through the European Horizon fund. “We understand that it is difficult to withdraw from these collaborations, but the UvA could at least express its desire to do so,” says organiser Heijnis. He hopes that the UvA will approach the European Commission so that it will give the university permission to withdraw from the collaborations.
The demonstrators chanted slogans such as “UvA shame on you, blood on your hands” and, right in front of the Maagdenhuis, “Shut it down, shut it down”. There were also brief chants of ‘Death, death to the IDF’. Punk rap duo Bob Vylan recently came under fire for using this slogan during their performance at the Paradiso pop venue.
Many protesters were still wearing their red clothing from Sunday's national pro-Palestine protest. At that demonstration on Museumplein, 250,000 Dutch people, mostly dressed in red, called on the government to draw a “red line” against the Israeli government.
