LET GMU ADMIN KNOW THAT WE DEMAND THEY REINSTATE SJP AT MASON AND ALLOW STUDENT ORGANIZERS TO RETURN TO CAMPUS.

On November 7, 2024, a raid was conducted at the off-campus residence of two officers from the Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) chapter at Mason. The raid involved a large contingent of armed Fairfax County and GMU police officers. They were informed that the search was related to property damage incidents at the Fairfax campus.

The next day, November 8th, an email was sent to one of the targeted SJP officers indicating that SJP had been placed under an interim suspension order. However, due to the seizure of their electronic devices by the police, they did not receive the suspension notice until the following week. Alarmingly, neither SJP’s faculty advisor nor the other officers or members of SJP received ANY notice of the organization’s suspension.

Additionally, soon after the suspension of SJP, the two students were served with criminal trespass notices from George Mason PD that bar both students from campus for four years.The notices, if left in place, will effectively expel both students from Mason, thus violating their right to an education without the due process afforded to all students under the Code of Student Conduct.

This is a gross violation of students’ rights and highlights the hypocrisy of GMU, a university that prides itself on diversity, inclusion, and free speech. However, we see this as it is: a blatant targeting of Palestinian organizers and the ONLY Palestinian organization at George Mason University.

We, the students of GMU, echo the demands set by GMU's Faculty for Justice in Palestine (FSJP) as listed below:

1. Administrators must immediately revoke the trespass orders against these two students, allowing them to come to campus and to continue their education.

2. Administrators must work with GMU Campus Police and Fairfax County Police to immediately return the students’ smartphones and laptops, so that they can resume their education, which has been on hold since November 7th.

3. The Office of Student Involvement must immediately reinstate the Mason chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine as a Registered Student Organization.

4. We must begin a full and independent investigation of the series of communications and decisions (involving Mason Campus Police, administrators, and the Board of Visitors) that led to the police raid on the students’ residence on November 7, the subsequent trespass orders on both students, and the suspension of Mason’s chapter of the SJP, with results reported to the campus community in 60 days.

PROTESTING AGAINST GENOCIDE SHOULD NEVER BE MET WITH REPRESSION AND INSTITUTIONAL RETALIATION.

LET MASON ADMINISTRATION KNOW YOU WILL NOT STAND FOR REPRESSION BY ECHOING OUR DEMANDS!