Lily Belle Poling, Staff Photographer

Six individuals associated with Yalies4Palestine began a hunger strike “for Gaza” at noon on Saturday.

The group, which includes five undergraduate students and one recent Yale College graduate, will only consume water until Yale concedes to their list of demands, they told the News. The individuals spoke to the News on the condition of anonymity.

“Children and families are starving, so we’re in solidarity with Gaza, as well as students across the country that are hunger striking,” a hunger striker told the News on behalf of the group. 

The hunger strikers told the News that they began their protest in solidarity with a group of 25 students from California State Universities in Long Beach, San Jose, Sacramento and San Francisco, who began a hunger strike on May 5. They also pointed to Israel’s blockade of all goods and humanitarian aid to Gaza, which has halted the entry of any food, medicine and fuel since March 2.

Because most students have left campus for summer recess, the strikers said this form of protest was their way of “doing the most we can.”

The demands were sent by a Yalies4Palestine email address to University President Maurie McInnis, Yale College Dean Pericles Lewis, two other administrators and the 14 heads of colleges on Saturday morning. The email was signed by the name of the club and did not disclose the identities of the individual strikers.

In the email, Yalies4Palestine demanded that Yale adopt the same human rights investment policy as San Francisco State University and divest from “all corporations that supply weapons, military technology, surveillance systems, [and] infrastructure of services that facilitate violation of international human rights law.” 

The demands also call on Yale to end partnerships with Tel Aviv University, the Peace and Dialogue Leadership Initiative and any fellowships that fund student travel to Israel; to rescind its regulations that “limit peaceful protest and student advocacy” and to reduce the number of employees who mediate protests; and to ensure that “peaceful” protesters, including the hunger strikers, would not be punished. 

In Yalies4Palestine’s email to administrators, which was obtained by the News, the organization wrote that the hunger strikers were prepared to fast “indefinitely.” Participants told the News that they would be conducting their strike publicly outside of Sheffield Sterling Strathcona Hall “for the next few days” but that they were not sure where they would continue it once they left campus or New Haven. 

At 6:52 p.m., Earle Lobo, an administrator who mediates issues at protests and other events, responded to Yalies4Palestine’s email but did not directly address any of their demands. In an email obtained by the News, he wrote that participating in a hunger strike as a form of peaceful protest does not violate any University policies and encouraged the participants to review Yale’s Free Expression and Peaceful Assembly Guidance and Use of Outdoor Spaces policies. He also encouraged the hunger strikers to speak with clinicians and directed them to various campus health services.

“We deeply value Free Expression at Yale. These principles are fundamental to cultivating conversations and impacting change in a community where your voices, ideas, and discoveries can be shared, examined, and engaged with openly,” Lobo wrote to Yalies4Palestine.

As of 7:25 p.m. on Saturday, none of the original recipients of Yalies4Palestine’s email responded, a striker wrote to the News. 

When reached for comment, Lewis, the Yale College Dean, referred the News to University spokesperson Karen Peart.

Peart acknowledged receipt of the Yalies4Palestine demands and echoed Lobo in a statement to the News, repeating that Yale is “concerned for our students’ health and wellbeing” and “deeply committed to upholding the right to free expression.” Like Lobo, she wrote that participating in a hunger strike as a form of peaceful protest does not violate University policy.

Of the individuals participating in the hunger strike, three are graduating seniors, one is a junior, one is a sophomore and one graduated last spring.

Last spring, 14 students — 12 graduate students and two undergraduates — participated in a hunger strike to demand that Yale publicly divest from weapons manufacturers involved in Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza. On the fifth day of the hunger strike, the University announced that it would not divest from military weapons manufacturing, and the Yale Advisory Committee on Investor Responsibility “concluded that military weapons manufacturing for authorized sales did not meet the threshold of grave social injury, a prerequisite for divestment,” in their statement announcing the decision. The students ended their strike on its eighth day.

Pro-Palestinian demonstrations at Yale have seen significantly fewer attendees during the 2024-25 academic year than they did last spring. On April 22, around 200 pro-Palestinian protestors set up an encampment on Beinecke Plaza to protest an upcoming talk near Yale’s campus by far-right Israeli security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir. That encampment lasted less than three hours.

Multiple protesters were referred to Yale’s Executive Committee for disciplinary action related to their participation in the protest. They face disciplinary action for failing to comply with the time, place and manner rules regarding use of outdoor spaces and, in some cases, for failing to comply with administrators’ requests, according the University spokesperson.

Yalies4Palestine’s status as a registered student group was revoked by Yale College on April 23 because of the organization’s role in promoting the protest on Beinecke Plaza.

Update, May 12: This article has been updated to explain why some protesters were referred to the Executive Committee for their participation in the April 22 protest on Beinecke Plaza.