People’s Inquiry exposes university censorship on Palestine

Dean: “We have received an anonymous complaint about your teaching related to Palestine.”

Teacher: “What specifically about my teaching?”

Dean: “I can’t say specifically, because that could breach the student’s anonymity.”

Teacher: “How can I respond to the accusation unless I know what it was I said that was the problem?”

Dean: “I can say only in general terms that there were several examples. That you were not presenting all sides of the debate.”

Teacher: “Can I know whether it was one of my students who complained?”

Dean: “No. And you cannot tell anyone of the existence or nature of this complaint.”

This conversation occurred at an Australian university. We know about it only because it was described in a confidential submission to the People’s Inquiry into Campus Free Speech on Palestine. In all likelihood, similar conversations have been happening behind closed doors in deans’ offices at campuses all over the country.

University staff and students are being subjected to spurious complaints and opaque disciplinary procedures for expressing support for Palestine. They are being accused of prejudice—or worse, of antisemitism—for speaking against a genocide. In many cases, those students and staff aren’t even allowed to speak publicly about their experience.

The widespread censorship of pro-Palestine speech on Australian university campuses was what motivated a group of students in Students for Palestine to establish a People’s Inquiry. Inspired by the Russell Tribunal of the 1960s, which assembled prominent figures to investigate US war crimes in Vietnam, the People’s Inquiry brought together members and representatives of the National Union of Students, the Australia Palestine Advocacy Network, the Jewish Council of Australia, as well as Greens Senator Mehreen Faruqi and human rights activists and academics. The aim was to shine a light on the alarming situation unfolding on university campuses.

After the People’s Inquiry was launched, we received more than 150 submissions from twenty universities across Australia, an indication of the systematic nature of censorship when it comes to Palestine. The submissions detailed instances of repression, intimidation, silencing and punishment of university staff and students expressing support for Palestine and opposition to Israel’s genocide.

A small selection of the submissions formed the basis for the inquiry’s preliminary report, “Don’t talk about Palestine: it’s a career killer”. The title was taken from one of those submissions. In it, the submitter said they had received that advice from the director of a political research centre based at the University of Queensland.

Following the preliminary report’s publication, the People’s Inquiry held two days of public hearings, one at the University of Sydney and one at the University of Melbourne, inviting university students and staff to share their stories.

Before they were allowed to proceed, People’s Inquiry organisers at the University of Sydney were required by management to read out a statement assuring the audience that the university was committed to “freedom of speech and academic freedom as foundations to a vibrant democracy and our pursuit of knowledge”. The university was trying to cover its backside. But platitudes about free speech and “vibrant” democracies rang hollow in a room full of people who had come to listen to and share stories of censorship and arbitrary discipline. The irony appears lost on Vice-Chancellor Mark Scott, who didn’t accept an invitation to appear at the hearing.

At the University of Melbourne, a photographer with the Australian Associated Press was initially prevented by security from entering the room where the hearing was taking place, but he was eventually let in. Maybe it was the act of an overzealous guard, but “Journalist denied access to free speech inquiry” would not have been a good headline for the university in any case.

The public hearings shed further light on the regime of censorship on university campuses. The panel heard from National Tertiary Education Union branch committee members who revealed that two staff members had been sacked from the University of Melbourne for speaking about Palestine. A medical student related that he was refused permission to organise an information stall on the situation in Gaza at the annual medical students’ conference.

There are high-profile cases of university repression of pro-Palestine speech, such as the tracking of pro-Palestine students through the wi-fi at the University of Melbourne. There’s the case of the international student at the University of Sydney who faced the potential cancellation of her student visa and deportation for writing pro-Palestine messages on a whiteboard.

Then there are the cases of repression and censorship that don’t make the headlines: the private meetings with management and the veiled threats couched in the language of “safety” or “wellbeing”. Many instances have been reported to the People’s Inquiry, but there are likely many more.

While we should not encourage university management to take a more active role in policing speech and political opinions on campuses, it is remarkable that supporters of Israel seem to have faced no consequences for cheering on a genocidal regime that is using starvation to decimate Gaza’s civilian population. At Monash University, Israel supporters repeatedly harassed and assaulted pro-Palestine students at the Gaza Solidarity Encampment and faced no consequences.

Students and staff speaking and protesting in support of Palestine are often accused by supporters of Israel of spreading hatred and division. Yet when Mark Leibler, a member of the University of Melbourne’s University Council, in a social media post described anti-Zionist Jews as “repulsive and revolting human beings” whose family members murdered by the Nazis would “undoubtedly be turning in their graves”, the university defended him on the grounds that the remark was made “in his personal capacity” and not as a university representative. Perhaps if students clarify that we oppose genocide in our “personal capacity” rather than as university students, we might be let off the hook? Somehow, I doubt it.

Why is this happening?

Universities often cultivate a self-image as institutions of free inquiry where challenging and controversial ideas are debated on their merits. In reality, universities serve power. Where it does exist, space for genuine political dissent has been carved out on the campuses despite university managers rather than because of them.

The higher education sector caters to modern capitalist economies’ ideological and technical needs. Universities are enormous workplaces: highly paid executives sit at the top and determine the day-to-day life of thousands of professional and academic staff. Each university competes with its peers in a global education market, vying for lucrative international student enrolments.

Reflective of their deep integration with and dependence on governments, universities frame their purpose in terms of the “national interest”. A statement published by Universities Australia in the lead-up to the 2025 federal election described universities as “vital national assets” that “underpin our nation’s prosperity” and strengthen our “international competitiveness”.

Let’s remind ourselves what “national interest” really means. It means shielding Australia’s allies from attack or criticism, even (or especially) when that ally is committing crimes against humanity.

The national interest means spending upwards of $368 billion to acquire a fleet of nuclear-powered submarines—a sum that could build more than a million new public housing units. In a media release from November 2023, Universities Australia again spelled it out: “The planning, construction, operation and maintenance of our nuclear-powered submarines will not be possible without the skilled workers our unis educate or the research they undertake”.

As great-power conflict returns to the centre of world politics, Australian universities are giddy about the research and funding opportunities being presented. The University of Melbourne, for example, is spending $2 billion on a new campus at Fishermans Bend that will host partnerships with major weapons manufacturers.

Little wonder that the universities react with hostility to the pro-Palestine movement. Our movement wants to disrupt business as usual. We call out the crimes of a key Western ally in the Middle East and our own government’s complicity. We oppose the booming military-industrial complex.

The problem for university managers is that students have been at the forefront of this movement. Students, many staff and thousands of others have refused to be silenced and browbeaten. We have rejected the lies of the people in power. We have camped, petitioned, occupied, rallied, assembled and protested for Palestine.

In response, campuses have become the centre of attacks on free speech and political organising. Labor-appointed Special Envoy Jillian Segal paid particular attention to the universities in her “Plan to Combat Antisemitism”, which is, in reality, a plan to silence criticism of Israel. She wants universities to crack down even harder on pro-Palestine action and thought, and her plan proposes cutting funding from universities that don’t.

The repression playing out on campuses is serious. But it is possible to push back. Universities are susceptible to pressure. Defending the indefensible crimes of the Israeli state demands an authoritarian logic, but universities are also under pressure at least to appear to support open academic inquiry. Resistance from students and staff can beat back the attacks. The People’s Inquiry into Campus Free Speech on Palestine aims to give a voice to those who have been silenced and to expose the universities’ chilling attacks against those who stand for justice in Palestine.

James McVicar is a panellist on the People’s Inquiry and the education officer for the National Union of Students.