Support Pro-Palestine Students, Activists Prosecuted by Penn

We are organizing on behalf of three people being persecuted for their involvement in anti-genocide and pro-Palestine organizing at the University of Pennsylvania. These individuals are being unfairly prosecuted for events that occurred during the weeks of the first Philadelphia Gaza Solidarity Encampment.

After a months-long legal process, UPenn is forcing three individuals to pay thousands of dollars for alleged property damage by March 1, 2025. The amount paid to UPenn is $14,484, and court fees are $2,565.75 between the three individuals. The total amount needed is $17,049.75. If these payments are not made, the activists will not enter diversion and will risk criminal convictions.

Along with having to navigate the dehumanizing “justice” system, all three individuals have faced unjust educational and professional consequences for their involvement with activities surrounding the Gaza Solidarity Encampment. One individual, a student at Penn, has been suspended and banned from campus since May 2024. The ongoing suspension has made it impossible for them to continue their education. Another individual, a student at Temple University, has been forced to undergo a semester-long suspension for protest activity that occurred on UPenn’s campus, not Temple’s. The third individual, a Philly community member, lost their job after being arrested for their participation in protest activity.

This is the latest in UPenn’s cowardly campaign against student and community activists speaking out against the genocide of Palestinians. They have arrested and suspended community members, raided the homes of student activists, and stripped students and faculty of their First Amendment right to dissent against UPenn’s financial and educational partner of “Israel.”

Penn is a business institution with a $22.3 billion endowment intent on suppressing free speech by forcing three people to pay grossly inflated costs. We hope you can donate anything you are able to. Thank you so much.

In love and solidarity.