Since we can’t see our current endowment investments, we can’t know for sure what we’re invested in. However, we can make pretty good estimates based on a couple of things: 1. who were our investment managers in the past (some of this stuff is floating in various pieces on the innerwebs, like on guidestar or in lists GSOC compiled years back) 2. what kind of investments these firms tend or tended to make (for example, the press sometimes notes these things, as with the Madoff scandal, and sometimes bigger firms will have general or sample information on their website) 3. political tendencies of the folks in charge of the endowment investments. (e.g. the chair of the Board’s investment comittee, Michael Steinhardt, mentioned above, publicly known for his “philanthropy” to anti-palestine causes)This doesn’t say that Steinhardt, et al, ARE investing money in Israel, but to me personally, it says that they’re certainly not opposed to it. We also know for sure that our money is going to NYU-Tel Aviv, and it’s partner university, U of Tel Aviv, which has been sanctioned by many academic institutions for its work researching and developing technologies that allow the Israeli government to oppress Palestinians.

So we DON’T know about investments for sure, which is why Take Back NYU! continues to demand endowment disclosure, and why the occupation called for an INVESTIGATION into NYU’s complicity in war profiteering and wrongs in Palestine.

As to the administrations response, in case you haven’t heard, 18 students were suspended for a week and are on probation. Perhaps the MORE messed up punishment is that these students have been FORBIDDEN to be a member of any NYU club for the rest of the year, and BARRED from holding any leadership roles (club e-board, student councils, peer educator, RA etc.) until sometimes next spring! Methinks the university is a bit scared of TBNYU! spreading these cuh-razy ideas. It’s also a bit backwards that the admin’s response is like “We want you to voice your opinions through official channels. But we’re going to close those channels off to you, so … well, yeah, just be quiet now plz kthx bai.” Silly admin doesn’t realize that the beauty of a non-hierarchical organization is that having “official” leaders is sooooo superfluous to its operation…

Long Live Take Back NYU for raising these issues.

I have been closely watching your actions, to my suprise and for the first time American, British and world wide campuses are ingnited with protest over the assault on Gaza and on the assualt on academic and educational insitiutes including two UN schools and the Islamic University. Israel since palestinain higher education was established has been denying students from education by closing down universities such as Birzeit in the 1980s or have been targeting and arresting Palestinain students. Universities in the West Have been silent, students, adminstrators and besides the rare voices, no one said anything about it. Israel remains to be a country supported directly and enormously by both the EU and U.S. This has to stop.

I am not only grateful but also amazed, you have ingnited in me and other Palestinains around the world a hope in a changing and peaceful future were Palestinains will be upgraded from the sub-human status to just a human status.

Thanks a lot for adding Palestine into your demands, Thanks for raising your voices, i do understand how hard is it.

“Its better to die on your feet, then to live on knees”

Your courage, your determination is what you need. Always remeber you might be paying a high price but freedom without a tax is no freedom.

Love and support from Palestine,
Abdaljawad OA Hamayel

What about them?

And who are you to assume the needs of all nyu students and occupy a building we ALL worked hard to pay for. I for one strongly believe that Israel is defending itself in the only way it can and is doing so after being patient for WAY to long. To first say that Israel is the reason for the destruction of the university of gaza and then to say that NYU contributed to that is completely ridiculous!

And even if it wasn’t, you didn’t make any of these supposedly justifiable points prior or even during your protest so how did you expect people to take you seriously??

TBNYU, you are a joke.