Statement of Solidarity

As many of us have expressed individually in various channels, we are shocked by the suffering that children and families have experienced in Israel following the attack and taking of hostages by Hamas and are now experiencing in the collective punishment and unfathomable violence inflicted on Palestinians by the Israeli government in Gaza and the West Bank. There is no justification for killing, assault and violence against civilians. As a group of researchers and educators that aspires to critical practices, elastic solidarities, and life-affirming infrastructures, we condemn anti-Semitism, anti-Semitic rhetorics, islamophobia as well as racist agitation and occupation policies.

We are committed to trans-local, borderless knowledge production that, to borrow the words of architect and educator Pelin Tan, extends beyond the familiar terrains of design to encompass questions like citizenship, institutionalism, borders, war, being a refugee, documents and documenting, urban segregation, the commons, and pedagogies that depart from social injustices that traditional design practices have created.

In the context of our current research discussions and work we write this statement in support of the civilians, our alumni and friends and their families who are living in Palestine, Israel and Lebanon, but also those that we don’t know or will never meet. Palestinian people are not to be equated with Hamas, just as Jewish people are not to be equated with the Israeli government. We protest against the devastating siege and destructive bombardment of Gaza as well as the deliberate criminalization and violent suppression of protest movements worldwide. Aid organizations have lost contact, hospitals and refugee camps have been targeted. Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have been made refugees for a third time. We call for the declaration of an immediate ceasefire, the opening of a humanitarian corridor, and an end to the siege. A ceasefire is the lowest denominator, the minimum, really, the very least. It is absolutely shocking that calls for a ceasefire are being described as one-sided. The common grounds of humanity are sometimes inhumanely far off.

• The original post (24/10) and this updated version were written by Helen Pritchard and Johannes Bruder, and is supported by Matthias Böttger, Catherine Walthard, Viktor Bedö, Budhaditya Chattopadhyay, Jan Torpus, Solveig Suess, Yann Patrick Martins, Flavia Caviezel, Moritz Greiner-Petter, Anastasia Kubrak, Selena Savic, Therese Keogh, Laura Pregger, Anna Laederach, Matthias Maurer, Gillian Wylde, Florence Le Bègue, Sabine Fischer, Paul Schweizer, Tina Omayemi Reden, Tania Messell. We are committed to working on tools, practices and approaches, pedagogical resources to continue this discussion.