COLLEGE campuses across the US have erupted into student demonstrations and sit-ins protesting the genocide in Gaza. Students across every religious denomination are involved. Columbia University, my alma mater, has been most prominently in the news. Not only for being the first set of students to call out their university, but also for the harsh retaliation by its administration. The university’s current president is a woman of Egyptian descent — Baroness Nemat ‘Minouche’ Shafiq.
Great progress around women’s and minorities’ rights has been made since the turn of the century. More and more, we see men and women of colour populate what used to be the domain of ‘white’ Westerners. There was much celebration when Shafiq was announced Columbia’s next president. In the UK, Rishi Sunak became the first prime minister of South Asian origin. Pakistanis had witnessed the journey of Malala Yousafzai from a traumatised child victim of extremist violence to a young woman at ease in the company of Western political and social elites. While controversy surrounded her, she epitomised struggle and achievement to me.
Today, conversely, as we watch six months of the Israel-Palestine war unfold,........