The Associated Student Senate passed a unanimous resolution demanding Mt. SAC to call for an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, as well as a resolution for the campus to divest from companies profiting off “unethical” business practices.
The meeting began at 3 p. m. Tuesday afternoon and featured a large crowd of over 40 students and staff in attendance, most of who came out to support the AS calls for divestment and a ceasefire resolution specifically.
The call for a ceasefire in Gaza passed with a 15-0 unanimous vote, while the call for transparency and divestment passed 13-0 with two abstentions.
The divestment resolution and humanitarian ceasefire resolution, which will be presented to the Board of Trustees on June 26 state that acts of human suffering and genocide should be condemned in all forms. The resolutions also added that it is imperative for Mt. SAC to stand with its student body by heeding their demands for an immediate ceasefire resolution, as well as full transparency of the college’s financial investments and divestment from “all corporations and entities found to be complicit in unethical business and the funding of human suffering.”
After the resolutions passed, AS President Dani Garcia explained that the next steps would include a boycott of the Starbucks already on campus. She added that instead they could use the diverted funds to place Keurig’s in recognized student club spaces, allowing the student organizations to sell coffee to raise funding for their activities and events.
Many students gave passionate public comments denouncing Israel’s continued assault on the Gaza strip, particularly its most recent bombardment of Rafah this past weekend and its illegal expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank. They demanded the campus to take action and make their voices heard.
Mt. SAC student Tasneem Hamideh made her demands clear in public comment.
“On the list of demands that we present to you today the most important is Mt. SACs support for an immediate ceasefire,” Hamideh said. “In the last few weeks the situation in Gaza has been at its worst. In the last two days Israel bombed Rafah more than 60 times in 48 hours, and last night while you were sleeping Israel attacked again. For those of you that are unaware, Rafah is a tent camp housing over 1.5 million displaced residents, making it the most densely populated place in the world.”
Second year student Melissa Nunez also condemned Mt. SACs decision barring Professor Raul Chavez from holding a viewing of the documentary film “Occupation of the American Mind.” She said that Mt. SAC administration’s decision to censor Chavez was antithetical to the college’s stated principles.
“Mt. SAC is a school that claims equity and diversity as some of their core values, however when the voices of marginalized students and professors speaking out against genocide are being censored,” Nunez said. “We have a responsibility to condemn Mt. SACs failure to uphold their mission, vision and values, as well as the clear suppression of pro-Palestinian voices on campus in favor of Zionist interest.”
Should the resolutions make it through, the Mt. SAC Board of Trustees would join over 70 cities and dozens of college campuses state-wide to call for an immediate end to war between Israel and Hamas.
