Your Education Is Supported by Mass Murderers

WILL IRVINE (HE/HIM)

Last week, Student Justice for Palestine Pōneke (SJP) revealed that the $69 million investment portfolio managed by the Victoria University Foundation, which is managed in part by Nikko Asset Management, invests in Israeli government bonds alongside weapons and intelligence developers.

The fund helps the University carry out large-scale projects and maintain financial solvency, and is funded largely by donors and ex-students. It is a crucial part of the university’s financial power in a neoliberal academic climate. On the Foundation’s page, it identifies itself as an adherent to the UN Principles for Responsible Investment, which gave the University 3/5 stars on “Policy Governance and Strategy”.

Despite so-called ethical investing, the Foundation appears to have no qualms with investing in Israel Bonds, which help the Israeli government maintain a strong financial situation, despite an increasingly costly genocide. Without the strong support of US and International backers, including the Foundation, the Zionist entity would be less able to carry out its campaign of extermination against the Palestinian people, and the fascist Netanyahu government would have significantly less popular support.

Additionally, SJP said that Nikko invests in Palantir and Safran. Safran is a French defence contractor that helps manufacture the drones that are used to massacre civilians in Gaza. Palantir, owned by farright bankroller Peter Thiel, creates the racial profiling systems that Israel uses to enforce its apartheid state. In 2011, the Key Government granted Thiel citizenship despite having spent only 12 days in the country. He now owns a large chunk of Wānaka.

Visit @sjp.poneke on Instagram for their petition urging the university to divest from the apartheid state of Israel.