Colonial legacies and racialised threats: how the “terrorism” discourse stigmatises Palestine solidarity activism at Canadian universities

In response to Israel’s genocidal campaign in Gaza, students across universities in North America and Europe organised encampments to demand that their institutions pressure Israel to end its violence in Gaza and occupation of Palestine. Focusing on Canadian universities, our paper explores how the “terrorism” discourse shaped under the War on Terror is used against the Palestine solidarity student encampments. We rely on the critical terrorism scholarship that is attuned to the colonial underpinnings of contemporary responses to “terrorism”, as well as the underlying racial-nationalist ideas that cast Muslims, and by extension Palestinians, as civilisational threats to the West. We examine the responses of university administrations to encampments across 18 universities. We also analyse mainstream media reporting of encampments in four news outlets between April and September 2024. We find that representations of encampments (1) reproduce unsubstantiated accusations of “terrorism”, (2) present encampments as being against Canadian “values” and (3) raise concerns about demographic shifts to explain Palestine solidarity. This work addresses a gap in critical studies in terrorism by asking how the “terrorism” discourse shapes engagement with Palestine solidarity activism. It also adds to the burgeoning scholarship on anti-Palestinian racism, which captures how Palestinians and their allies face silencing, exclusion and dehumanisation.