The European Union of Jewish Students (EUJS) is the democratic, peer-led, umbrella organization of Jewish Student Unions in 36 countries, representing 160.000 young Jews between 18-35 across Europe.
The Jewish Student Union of Germany (JSUD) is a non-profit organization based in Berlin and has been founded in 2016 for the purpose of a nationwide representation of 25 000 Jewish students and young Jewish adults in Germany.
Why?
Right now over a million Uyghur Muslims are being held behind several layers of fences, barriers and sophisticated surveillance, in vast, industrial-scale concentration camps in the Chinese province of Xinjiang.
The Chinese government is persecuting its Muslim minority population through a ruthless, industrialized campaign of brainwashing, torture, and dehumanisation.
In the concentration camps, leaked files2 revealed that people are forced to eat pork, drink alcohol and denounce their identity as Muslims. Detainees are forced to take pills, injections, and are subjected to sterilization procedures, medical experiments and organ harvesting.
The machinery of the Chinese state, actively aided by corporations such as Huawei and passively aided by the indifference of the rest of the world, is being used to silently strip the Uyghurs of their human rights. China is committing a cultural genocide.
And yet, the world’s silence on this issue, regardless of a few periodic spikes of punctuated attention, has been deafening.
Millions of people are currently in industrial Concentration Camps – not Extermination Camps. As Jews, a people who have endured genocide and statelessness in the past, we cannot be quiet. Every year we say “Never Again!”, and for us, this has to be more than an empty statement.
That’s why we fight antisemitism. That’s why we believe we need to act now in solidarity with the Uyghurs. We are mandated by our history to be as loud as we can in the face of genocide. That’s why we say: Never Again, Right Now!
The fight for human rights and Jewish rights is one fight, and in that spirit, we say: it’s time to stand up, be counted, and act to stop the Uyghur cultural genocide.
As young Europeans, we believe in championing and strengthening diversity in our societies. China is threatening those very values. As Europeans, we can speak up. We still have the opportunity to shape how a world with China as a global super-power will look like. So we must stand in solidarity with those whose diversity is under attack.
That’s why EUJS and JSUD, together with young Jewish student leaders across Europe, are launching our ambitious action-focused campaign to put pressure on China, raise our collective voice against injustice, and break the world’s silence on the Uyghurs’ plight.
How?
In an action-filled campaign throughout Europe EUJS & JSUD aim to raise awareness on one of the world’s most pressing issues, mobilize people to act and ultimately influence political and corporate decisions. We want to use the platform that we as young Jews have to raise awareness for the world’s biggest persecuted minority.
Publicity Campaign
The first part of the campaign will start with a number of op-eds in leading newspapers around Europe, together with a publicity campaign conducted through neveragainrightnow.com, social media, and a petition aimed at European lawmakers.
To reach enough people to have an impact we need you and your networks! Please help us inform the world on China’s atrocities and why we need to act now.
Action
In the second part, we plan to have a number of demonstrations and protest actions in several European cities together with the World Uyghur Congress. We would welcome your both mobilization but also by independent actions during our protest week, around the 1st of March.
We can provide you with contacts to local Uyghur groups and can also help with marketing materials!
Additionally, we plan a number of actions shining a spotlight on companies that are complacent with China’s cultural genocide against the Uyghurs, using guerilla campaign methods and public awareness campaigns. At the same time, we plan to lobby Parliaments around Europe to take decisive actions against China.
