The Gaza Conflict Reaches Home: Demonstrations at the University of Birmingham

Extraordinary events, in the context of the recent history of the University of Birmingham, in the last 48 hours....

On Tuesday afternoon,  a group of students protesting the Israeli invasion of Gaza ---- I was told there were more than 40 --- occupied a lecture room, hanging a banner on the balcony overlooking the University Quadrangle. A detailed statement by the students condemned both the Israeli military offensive and the firing of rockets into Israel and emphasised:

We are acting in solidarity with Palestinian students whose right to education is being denied by the current conflict (both directly and as a consequence of a) the killing and injuring of hundreds of students, teachers, and other workers associated with education in Gaza during Israel’s military operation; b) the deliberate targetting and destruction of university buildings, the destruction of schools, the ministry of education, and other educational infrastructure in Gaza as part of Israel’s military operation; c) the conditions of the illegal occupation enforced by the Israeli military and supported by the political and military leaders of the state of Israel within the illegally occupied Palestinian territories, which includes deliberate strategies to restrict the movement of students and generally disrupt education within the territories.

The demonstration turned into a mini-standoff with police before University officials and students reached an agreement. Under that agreement, the Vice-Chancellor of the University is meeting student representatives today to hear their petition and a list of nine points for action, which includes a public discussion of the issues surrounding the Gaza conflict. As I write, there are two demonstrations involving, according to one of our readers, about 250 students.

This may not seem much, both in the context of Gaza events and the size of other protests, but Birmingham has not had a significant student demonstration since the 2003 Iraq War and has not had an occupation since I started here in 1989.

Enduring America Special: A Tale of Two Inaugurations

David Dunn, Reader in International Politics at the University of Birmingham, was a Fulbright Fellow in Washington eight years ago. Watching from a distance this time, he has offered Enduring America his thoughts on the meaning of the day and on Presidents Bush and Obama.

Resident in Washington in January 2001 as a Fulbright Fellow I was determined to witness the inauguration of the new President. My American friends were much more sceptical – “You’ll freeze to death and won’t get close enough to see anything” was the common line. On both points they were partly right, the temperature never ventured above freezing and my feet turned to ice standing on the muddy grass of Washington’s Mall, mostly watching the event on huge screens, occasionally glancing at the pin sized figures beyond. None of them elected to come with me - in part also because they weren’t celebrating the new administration. And yet I got a better sense of the occasion than I would have got watching it on TV, and certainly enough to know that eight years later this will be a very different event.



While the weather and ceremony will remain points of continuity Obama’s inauguration will differ in many ways. Bush’s first inauguration was marked by massive protests with crowds chanting loudly about the stolen 2000 election. Viewing the police dogs and horses I decided against joining in, fortuitously as it turned out as the protestors weren’t allowed on to the Mall. Despite this, however, their cries of “Hail to the Thief” were a constant background to the relayed address to the assembled crowd. Despite what was seen and heard on TV the event represented a divided Washington and a divided country. By contrast the mood in 2009 will be one of universal celebration of the election of a candidate widely seen as the antidote to eight years of Bush and his administration’s policies.

The pre-event celebrations were also of a different order. While bands played on the Mall for Bush they did so to a smaller and to a much less inclusive crowd. Indeed in January 2001 the focus was on presidential balls not parades, events which were all cowboy boots, Stetsons and swagger, symbols of the Presidency to come which played squarely to its own political base rather than to the nation as a whole. There was a mood of the Texan Republicans taking over political Washington, not coming in to work with it. This time round with a 70% approval rating and a mood of national celebration the contrast could not be more marked. Obama’s inauguration is an all inclusive event. A celebration of what is possible through the democratic process, an event as much about out reach and inclusivity as it is possible to imagine.

Expectations of the inauguration address are also quite different. For the famously anti-intellectual and inarticulate Bush little was expected and the words were quickly forgotten. By contrast the world will hang on every word and phrase uttered by Obama. Part of the reason for this is the different word the two Presidents were bequeathed. Bush inherited a country at peace with a budget surplus and an economy enjoying the fruits of a long economic boom. For Obama the task is more demanding, America is at war in Iraq and Afghanistan and the American and world economies are in the largest crisis for seventy years. People expect more of Obama largely because they need to. The skills he displayed as a presidential candidate who came from nowhere to defeat first the Clintons and then McCain and the Republican Party show a wily politician and a shrewd strategist. They also show a leader focused on uniting his country and ending divisions internationally too. As well as the obvious celebration of the inauguration of America’s first black President this historic occasion of the first black president there is also what else that represents, that Obama optimises the antithesis of the cleavages that have divided America. He is the antidote to President Bush’s black and white approach to politics.

Watching the inauguration this time from a far reminds me what an unusual spectacle the occasion is. There is no real equivalent at home or elsewhere in Europe, accept perhaps in the very different form of a coronation which last occurred of course in the UK in 1953. In part because the event follows many weeks after the election itself it is also one irresistibly redolent with expectation. It offers a firmer sense of demarcation between governments than the furniture shifting at No 10 Downing Street. A more categorical punctuation mark between presidencies than would otherwise occur. And in 2009 more than most occasions it reinforces the power of democratic renewal in American and beyond.