‘They will budge’: Pro-Palestine protesters at Danish university hopeful of divestment success

By Ebad Ahmed

PRAGUE (AA) – For over two weeks, hundreds of students have been encamped at the University of Copenhagen, one of hundreds of similar protests sweeping the entire globe.

Their demands are centered on divestment from companies linked to Israel, while also pressing the university administration to declare Israel’s ongoing assault on Gaza a genocide.

Talks are ongoing with the administration, which earlier put out a statement asserting that the university “as an institution has no, and will have no, position on the ongoing conflict in Gaza.”

“The university management cannot and should not express an opinion on behalf of the university’s employees and students about political matters, including about the ongoing conflict,” read the statement.

Despite the university’s stance, the protesters still believe they have a shot at an agreement.

“We think we have an opening. We are pretty sure that we can achieve something very meaningful right now,” Emil, a protester, told Anadolu.

Henrik Wegner, the university’s rector, also recently called on the protesters to end the encampment, saying the university has already pulled out 7.9 million Danish krone ($1.1 million) of its 8.9 million Danish krone ($1.3 million) investments in UN-blacklisted companies.

That decision, he said, was a direct result of the campaign run by the group called Students Against Occupation.

The group have rejected the claim, asserting that it is “an outright lie that the University of Copenhagen has divested on its own accord.”

“These actions were made by the asset management companies and not actively encouraged by the varsity,” the group said in a statement.

The protesters also accuse Education Minister Christina Egelund of issuing “vague” threats that the government could be forced to “send in the police” to clear the camp, opening up the possibility of the sort of violence that has been seen against peaceful protesters in the US and other European countries such as Germany, France and the Netherlands.

- ‘We are growing stronger each day’

Another protester who spoke to Anadolu said the encampment has received a lot of encouraging support.

“People are really supportive of our cause so the encampment is going really well,” the student said, requesting anonymity due to fear of reprisals.

“Of course, there is some difficulty as the university has said they won’t comply to any of our demands. But we think they will budge in the future because we are growing stronger each day.”

One particular issue the students raised was what they say has been skewed and one-sided coverage from Danish media that portrays them in a negative light.

“The Danish media has tried to spin us in a way that is not true. Every time the media comes to show our encampment, they try to spin the story some wrong way,” said the student.

“They are either lying about how people are not comfortable, or try to show that we are lazy or … dangerous, and other stuff like that.”

- ‘Anti-Zionism is not antisemitism’

Having seen what their counterparts on other campuses around the world have been facing, the University of Copenhagen protesters are aware of how claims of antisemitism could be used to smear them and their cause.

“Antisemitism has no place in this camp and definitely does not exist in this camp, and we have made an extreme effort to not conflate anti-Zionism and antisemitism,” Neeve, a student, told Anadolu.

She said they have made it a point to even put up banners around the encampment with the same message.

“There is a huge difference between Jewish people and Zionists, and that has been made very clear in this camp,” she added.