This study investigates the targeting of Palestinian educational institutions as a systematic settlercolonial practice that extends beyond the physical destruction of schools and universities to the erosion of collective ontological continuity and epistemic capacity. It addresses a central problem: how does educide, manifested as direct violent destruction in Gaza and as gradual slow violence in Jerusalem, reconfigure Palestinian existence and undermine ontological security, and how is this existence rearticulated through practices of epistemic and ontological sumud? The study aims to analyze patterns of educide in Palestine, explain their relationship to ontological security, explore manifestations of ontological sumud among educational actors, and develop the concept of the “Witnessing University.”

Methodologically, the research adopts a critical qualitative approach grounded in discourse analysis and existential perspectives on ontological security, with a tailored tool—Existence Discourse Analysis (EDA). Empirical data were collected through 22 semistructured interviews with academics, teachers, and students from Gaza (12) and Jerusalem (10), selected purposively based on their direct experience of education under bombardment or coerced curricula. These interviews were complemented by the analysis of international reports, institutional documents, and digital content.

Findings reveal that in Gaza, educide has taken the form of largescale destruction of universities, schools, libraries, and academic staff, with selective targeting of memorybearers in the humanities and social sciences, producing profound feelings of identity disruption and futurelessness. In Jerusalem, educide has manifested as slow violence through the imposition of distorted curricula, conditional funding, and threats of closure, with systematic erasures of national symbols and narratives. The study concludes that educide represents an enduring colonial structure in which ontological security functions as a mediating variable in shaping displacement pressures. It further proposes the “Witnessing University” as a model of an academic institution that transforms into a documenting and resisting epistemic actor in the face of colonial erasure.

Conference Title

Session Protocols and Technical Directives International Academic Conference on "Palestinian Existence

Conference Country

Palestine

Conference Date

May 19, 2026 - May 20, 2026

Conference Sponsor

كلية القانون والاداره العامة في جامعة بيرزيت بالتعاون مع مجلة المستقبل اللبنانية

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Conference Website