On Feb. 27, Dartmouth Divest for Palestine — a coalition of College students, faculty, staff and alumni — organized a protest to “tell the Board of Trustees to invest in workers not the war machine,” according to a flyer for the event. Approximately 60 students and community members attended the protest.
The protesters’ demands reflected DD4P’s formal proposal for divestment — a 55-page document submitted to the College on Feb. 18 — from companies “directly involved in Israeli apartheid, genocide and violations of international law,” according to protest organizer Roan Wade ’25.
The group chose the timing and location of its protest — on the corner of the Green, across from the Hanover Inn — to coincide with a dinner held that night in a conference room for the Board of Trustees, according to Wade.
“We wanted to … make sure [the Board of Trustees] knows that we are not okay with [the administration’s negotiation] tactics and how they are treating workers, and … that students, workers and the community is mobilized around [the divestment] proposal and will not be silent until we get divestment,” Wade explained.
Divestment proposals concerning the College’s publicly traded shares are reviewed by the Advisory Committee on Investor Responsibility, which determines whether “action is warranted,” according to the ACIR website. A review is conducted “if and only if” the proposal describes how it meets the criteria for divestment, as outlined in the Board of Trustees Statement on Investment and Social Responsibility Issues. Additionally, a proposal for divestment must show that the Dartmouth community “has come to consensus” in support of the measure, according to the ACIR website.
“Decisions about our investments must not curtail debate or silence diverse perspectives,” College spokesperson Jana Barnello wrote in an email statement to The Dartmouth. “This approach reflects Dartmouth’s commitment to institutional restraint in service of enhancing, rather than quelling, discussion.”
Barnello added that ACIR has “received” DD4P’s divestment proposal and “will evaluate” it. Updates on the review will be posted to the ACIR website, she wrote.
In between picketing and chants, including “Disclose, Divest/We will not stop/We will not rest” and “Gaza, Gaza, don’t you cry/Palestine will never die,” protesters gathered in front of the Hanover Inn to listen to three speeches advocating for divestment.
One protester read a message from Omar Rashid ’29, an incoming freshman trapped in Gaza. Rashid wrote that he hopes to “live in peace after more than 440 days of this nightmare.”
“I feel the weight of not only losing my life but also the dream that I have come so close to achieving,” Rashid wrote. “Despite all the pain, I believe my dream is worth fighting for.”
Another speaker, who identified themself as a Dartmouth alum, discussed the “historical precedent” of protesting for divestment at the College, citing the South African divestment protests that began in 1978. However, the speaker acknowledged that Dartmouth only initiated its divestment 11 years later, in 1989.
“The administration and trustees would rather you not know this history,” the speaker said. “It’s easier for them to be comfortable, to have students who are so overwhelmed by their studies [that] they don’t have time to organize [or] dissent.”
The speaker then referred to a panel of “The Epic of American Civilization” mural by José Clemente Orozco, located in Baker-Berry Library, in which one skeleton “offers up” a baby skeleton as an offering surrounded by books and symbols of death. The mural represents College students who do not “right the wrongs they see,” they added.
“[Orozco] is brave and criticizes the institution that paid him,” the speaker said. “He is saying, ‘What is the point of education if you’re only reproducing death?’”
Past movements to divest at Dartmouth also inspired some protesters to attend. In an interview after the rally, retired Geisel School of Medicine professor David Kollisch said he was part of the protests for divestment from South Africa at the College when he was an active professor in the 1980s.
“[Protests] didn’t hurt [then] and may have helped,” he said. “Money is … one of the important levers that we have to stop conflict.”
Following the alumni speaker, GOLD-UE steward Kai Herron GR delivered a speech about “solidarity” between unions and pro-Palestinian protesters. According to Herron, SWCD’s first contract brought “monumental change” with “increased wages and numerous benefits,” but “Dartmouth is trying to claw back these benefits” in current negotiations.
“Labor and the fight against colonialism have always been deeply intertwined,” Herron said. “During the fight to end apartheid in South Africa, longshoremen and warehouse workers took action. … Now we are taking action.”
In an interview with The Dartmouth, GOLD-UE steward Amy Conaway GR emphasized the financial linkages between graduate student workers and the College’s investment portfolio.
“We generate money for the College and that money gets invested into war [and] genocide,” Conaway said. “That’s what we’re not comfortable with.”
