Across the United States and the world, students are putting their bodies on the line to demand their universities divest from weapons manufacturers that are sending bombs to murder innocent children in Gaza. Students are peacefully protesting for an end to U.S.-backed atrocities in Palestine, including the destruction of all universities in Gaza. They’re joined by movements of people of all ages and backgrounds coming together to say: Palestinians deserve to live.

Instead of listening to students who are non-violently protesting for peace, college and university administrators—and the boards that oversee them—are instigating brutal arrests to silence students and take away their First Amendment rights.

It is outrageous that police officers are now entering college campuses across our nation with their guns drawn, targeting students with pepper spray, tear gas, rubber bullets, tasers, and beatings.

For speaking up about our country’s complicity in human rights violations, more than 3,000 students and faculty have been arrested at Gaza solidarity protests in recent weeks. Many students and faculty members have been hospitalized from these violent crackdowns.

Even the United Nations’ Special Rapporteur on the right to education is concerned. She said, “I am deeply troubled by the violent crackdown on peaceful demonstrators, arrests, detentions, police violence, surveillance and disciplinary measures and sanctions against members of the educational community exercising their right to peaceful assembly and freedom of expression.”

From the civil rights movement to the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa, students have always been at the forefront of progress. Already due to this year’s student protests, multiple U.S. institutions of higher education have agreed to divest or explore divesting from companies connected with Israel’s oppression of Palestinians.

Many U.S. colleges and universities are financially invested in weapons manufacturers and war profiteers, and students are shining a light on this issue. Graduate student workers at University of California campuses are now beginning to strike, demanding divestment and demanding that the public university system stop cracking down on pro-Palestine protests.

We cannot stand by while our government enables mass slaughter and war crimes. And we cannot stand by as we watch escalating police repression against students protesting that violence by exercising their constitutional rights.

Sign on now to tell U.S. college and university administrators, and the boards that oversee them: Protect your students and their First Amendment rights. End the repressive tactics and denounce the police brutality at Gaza solidarity encampments. Stop suppressing the very activism, academic freedom, and thoughtful debate that you seek to inspire in your students.