Arizona Universities Attack Students for Palestine While Partnering with War Contractors

By Brenda Norrell, Censored News, May 13, 2024

Arizona's universities, once known for their sunshine and free spirit, are now hallmarks of censorship and oppression. The University of Arizona in Tucson, and Arizona State University in Tempe, are partnered with defense contractors, including Raytheon Missiles, a top war profiteer. The universities are smashing support for Palestine, and censoring voices opposed to war crimes and genocide.

For a second time, the University of Arizona in Tucson brought in police to attack students with rubber bullets and tear gas, after the encampment for Palestine was put up a second time on Thursday.

Here's what the mainstream media is not telling you: The University of Arizona in Tucson partners with Raytheon Missiles and other defense contractors, making it a partner in war crimes and genocide in Palestine. Raytheon Missiles, a top war profiteer, is housed at University of Arizona Tech Park and develops weapons with students. The university's College of Engineering shows its partners, which includes the defense contractors.

Meanwhile, the defense contracts pour into Arizona State University, in Tempe, in the Phoenix Valley. ASU has suspended 20 students arrested, among more than 70 arrested, in a midnight police raid at the encampment in support of Palestine. The students oppose the war crimes and genocide that the United States government is funding and providing weapons for.

Arizona State University also partners with Raytheon Missiles. ASU has new contracts for robotics and AI. Earlier, in 2020, ASU announced a five-year contract of over $42 million to design unmanned and robotics technologies and weapons systems for the Navy. Around the world, these unmanned killing robots are instruments of terror and death.

In Tucson, University of Arizona officials are now exposed for stalking students supporting Palestine. University officials stored students' social media posts, as students planned a pro-Palestine rally in November. The e-mails were revealed through a freedom of information request.

The University of Arizona in Tucson also partners with Universal Avionics, owned by Israel's Elbit Systems. Elbit is the weapons provider to Israel which built the spy towers, integrated fixed towers, on the Tohono O'odham Nation. Those 11 spy towers now provide video surveillance to the crime-infested U.S. Border Patrol, allowing Border Patrol agents to stalk O'odham on their homeland.

Based in Israel, Elbit manufacturers weaponized drones and surveillance used on Palestinians. Its factories are protested around the world.

Ophelia Rivas, Tohono O'odham, said, "The corporate institutions occupying O'odham lands in Arizona called the University of Arizona and the Arizona State University have egregiously violated human rights laws, attacking human rights defenders opposed to the corrupt united states system of genocide."

"Defenders and indigenous first people of this Turtle Island will not be erased," said Ophelia, speaking in solidarity with the students. Ophelia is founder of O'odham Voice against the Wall, and has provided testimony on the militarization of her homelands at both the United Nations and Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

In late October, after the genocide in Palestine was underway, the presidents of both the University of Arizona in Tucson and Arizona State University in Tempe led a coalition of universities to support Israel.

In Tucson, Students Against Apartheid demand that the University of Arizona produce a divestment plan and commit to open door negotiations. The organization condemned the aggressive police response to their actions.

Students Against Apartheid demands the university divest from Israel and Raytheon Missiles and make a public statement condemning Israel’s actions in the war.

They also call for four faculty members in the College of Engineering to be dismissed.

The University of Arizona in Tucson's College of Engineering website shows its Advisory Groups are packed with defense contractors.

It says, "Industry partners serving on advisory working groups help guide the future of UA Engineering. These individuals provide input on programs and course curriculum and aid in ensuring that the college’s training and research address industry needs."
Raytheon, which is located at the university's Tech Park, is on the list of advisory groups. The list continues, with more defense contractors partnering with the university.

Raytheon Missiles also has a factory on the Navajo Nation. The Raytheon Dine' Facility produces missile parts at the site. It is located on the tribe's commercial farm, Navajo Agricultural Products Industry, NAPI, near Shiprock, New Mexico. It is a fact censored by Indian Country Today in 2006.

"Raytheon Diné stores and generates parts for 12 missile programs such as the Tomahawk cruise missile, Javelin weapon system, and Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missile," Raytheon said.

Although the University of Arizona receives millions of dollars in grant funding for Native Americans, it has a long history of disrespecting Native American ceremonies and rights. In the 1990s, the University of Arizona and the Pope led the construction of telescopes on sacred Mount Graham and battled San Carlos Apaches in court in order to carry out the desecration.

The University of Arizona in Tucson's museum harbors O'odham remains in violation of federal law. Further, it profiteers from the knowledge of Native traditional foods, and the grassroots movement to protect the water, with non-profit organizations that receive lucrative grants.

Indigenous Action: Students Racially Profiled, Brutally Arrested in Flagstaff

Indigenous Action reports on the arrests at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff on the night of April 30, 2024:

Yesterday morning, a group of NAU students in occupied Kinłani took to the lawn outside the student union and joined the global struggle for a free Palestine. Many Indigenous students were present; sharing medicine, stories, songs, and dance as well as spreading the word on Indigenous issues happening in Kinłani itself such as the struggle against sacred site destructions, including showing support for Taydem James, a Diné high school student facing charges after being racially profiled and brutalized by FPD (Flagstaff Police Department.)

Despite harassment from Zionist counter-protestors, the camp remained determined to hold out, also despite calls from the university to disperse at 10 pm.

Like many stories we’ve all heard before, what started as a tame encampment led by self-appointed “marshals”, quickly turned brutal as riot police swept through campus, tackling, arresting, and even tasing students who refused to leave the encampment. Tear gas was also deployed and most of the self-appointed “leaders” were arrested.

This brutality only emboldened students as the numbers steadily grew from about a hundred to hundreds of people flooding the pedway, demanding the police leave. Chants of “Leave our campus!” and “Free free Palestine!” could be heard ringing off the mountain all over Kinłani.

In total, 26 were arrested and the organizers of the protest, NAU SJP (Students for Justice in Palestine) have announced that the events of the night will not deter them.

Killer robots: A fired United Nations attorney speaks out

A human rights attorney at the United Nations, fired for making a personal tweet about genocide, said he's happy to be leaving Geneva, that the United Nations is a facade.

Ousman Noor worked for an NGO which focused on halting killer robots, automated killing machines using AI, the automated killing machines that the Arizona State University has contracts for.

Noor, as he was leaving Geneva, said the conservative NGOs are so slow, and the NGOs at the U.N. are part of the whole do-nothing facade at the U.N. in Geneva.

Noor's comments mirror what many Native people who have testified at the UN Permanent Forum in New York, and in Geneva at CERD sessions tell Censored News: They say testifying at the U.N. is a waste of time, and the testimony goes nowhere, that there were no results from their efforts, and they wasted their time and money. Some Native people said they felt stalked by non-profits looking for the next big issue, the next big money-maker for their non-profit grants. Some said their words were plagiarized by profiteering college professors in books.

Ousman Noor wrote:

"It's my last day living in Geneva, Switzerland after nearly 5 years, I am leaving to Jordan tomorrow.

"Here is my parting message about the United Nations. It's basically a facade to give people an appearance that progress is happening, when it actually isn't. Real change comes from direct action and civil disobedience that disrupts that status quo, as we are seeing from students across campuses in America. If we don't resist we become complicit. Goodbye Switzerland, you are a beautiful country in other ways. Wish me luck for new adventures in Jordan."

In his video message, Noor says of the United Nations, "It seems like the whole place is a theater, where people act important." He says that he's just come to terms with how much bull sh-- there is. The genocide has made all of this clear.

Describing the rubber-stamping of existing systems, he says, "It's just become a machine where the status quo is perpetuated."

Listen to this video on Twitter/X at https://twitter.com/i/status/1786439630893547812

Trinity College Divests: Individuals could be responsible for war crimes

Cambridge's Trinity College is divesting in Elbit Systems and other arms companies, after being advised that individuals could be held responsible for complicity with war crimes.

"In response to this report, on 28 February the International Centre of Justice for Palestinians (ICJP), a UK-based rights group, issued a legal notice to Trinity College warning that its investments could make it potentially complicit in Israeli war crimes."

"The ICJP indicated in its legal notice that "officers, directors and shareholders at the college may be individually criminally liable if they maintain their investments in arms companies that are potentially complicit in Israeli war crimes and crimes against humanity."

Elbit, based in Israel, provides drones, weapons and surveillance used on Palestinians, and constructed the spy towers on the Tohono O'odham Nation. Elbit has received another contract to upgrade the spy towers on the southern border.

https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/cambridges-wealthiest-college-divest-arms-companies

Read more:

Arizona State University's Defense Contracts

ASU News in Tempe, Arizona: ASU receives three awards for research for critical national security

https://news.asu.edu/20240425-science-and-technology-asu-receives-3-awards-research-critical-national-security

ASU News: Raytheon opening engineering design hub at ASU's Skysong

https://news.asu.edu/20230728-arizona-impact-raytheon-opening-engineering-design-hub-asu-skysong


ASU's contract for unmanned robots and weapons

ASU News (2020) ASURE has been awarded a contract that could total as much as $42.4 million over the next five years to advance unmanned and robotic technologies and weapons systems.

The Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California, awarded $12 million now to the Arizona State University-affiliated applied research lab to solve the initial task and is offering the opportunity for an additional $30.4 million for subsequent tasks.

https://news.asu.edu/20200731-asu-research-enterprise-awarded-contract-advance-unmanned-and-robotic-technologies

University of Arizona Stalked Students Planning Palestine Rally

By Sam Parker, University of Arizona Wildcat, Tucson

The student newspaper, Arizona Wildcat, reports on the email revealed by way of a freedom of information request:

"Aura Bogado, an investigative journalist, posted a series of now-viral TikToks and tweets on May 2 discussing this email chain between leadership, including members of the University of Arizona Police Department and Interim Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost Ronald Marx."

"A point Bogado focused on was the supposed surveillance of different social media accounts, including the Coalition of Black Students and Allies. An email in the records identified by Bogado shows a university official discussing the circulation of posts about the walkout, especially focusing on the COBA Instagram."

“Looks like it just got picked up by COBA on Instagram which means they are pretty involved. The only positive news for us right now is that their account has been shadow-banned by Instagram so the reach of their posts is really limited,” an email from a university official read.

Read the full article: By Sam Parker, University of Arizona Wildcat, Tucson

https://wildcat.arizona.edu/155322/uncategorized/n-student-org-monitoring/

The document: E-mails of University of Arizona officials stalking students

Complete document:
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24634693-university-of-arizona-november-6-9-2023-emails

Raytheon Missiles at University of Arizona Tucson Tech Park: Arrests on November, 30, 2024

https://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2023/11/now-stop-genocide-raytheon-missiles.html

Censored by Indian Country Today -- Raytheon Dine' Facility: Making Missiles on the Navajo Nation

https://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2009/09/making-missiles-on-navajo-nations-farm.html


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