Students United for Palestinian Equal Rights (SUPER)

Students United for Palestinian Equal Rights supports the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement, an international campaign to delegitimize the State of Israel by isolating the country economically through consumer boycotts, business and government withdrawal of investment, and legal sanctions. ⁵

Affiliated Groups and Chapters

In 2024, the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP) submitted a report to the United States House of Representatives as testimony in a hearing entitled “Anti-Semitism on College Campuses.” ⁶ In the testimony, ISGAP scholars alleged that Students United for Palestinian Equal Rights is one of various entities under the direction of National Students for Justice in Palestine (NSJP), a  pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel advocacy group that organizes student activism on college campuses. ^{7 8} A Seattle Times opinion piece from 2023 referred to the University of Washington SUPER group as a “chapter of National Students for Justice in Palestine.” ⁹

Students United for Palestinian Equal Rights has active chapters at the following American colleges and universities: Oregon State University, Michigan State University, University of Washington, Western Washington University, Portland State University, and Macalester College. ^{10 11 9 12 13 14}

Notable Protests

The University of Washington chapter of Students United for Palestinian Equal Rights organized a “Day of Resistance and Protest” in October 2023 which followed the  National Students for Justice in Palestine playbook for how to organize such an event. ⁹ The playbook directly condones violence against Israel with the slogan: “when people are occupied, resistance is justified — normalize the resistance.” ¹⁵ A Seattle Times op-ed argued that the event “should have been called ‘A Day to Celebrate Hamas’” for its outward support for the Hamas terrorism against Israeli civilians on October 7, 2023. ⁹

In May 2022, the University of Washington SUPER group also signed a letter with over 60 other pro-Palestinian groups in support of Khaled Barakat, a Palestinian-Canadian writer and prisoners’ rights advocate who works for the anti-Israel Samidoun advocacy group. ¹⁶ Barakat has been accused of being a top-ranking member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), an internationally recognized terrorist organization and umbrella group for a number of militant organizations connected to the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). ^{17 18}

The Portland State University (PSU) chapter of Students United for Palestinian Equal Rights orchestrated a five-day occupation and encampment at the Portland State University library which caused $750,000 in damage and led to several arrests. The SUPER students called on the university to end its relationship with aerospace company Boeing and other manufacturers that supply weapons and other military materials to Israel. Portland State University president Ann Cudd defended her use of police force to end the occupation while also pausing all financial connections associated with Boeing, which had provided a one-time donation of $150,000 to the school and annually gave $28,000 in scholarships. ¹⁹ Boeing also regularly recruited PSU students. ²⁰

In May 2025, activists with SUPER’s UW chapter took over and occupied the University of Washington’s (UW) engineering building, using furniture and other items to barricade the entrances while vandalizing the building including setting a dumpster on fire near the encampment. Later that evening, police were able to remove the protesters while arresting roughly 30 activists that refused to leave. The group had reportedly committed the takeover to force UW to end relations with multinational company Boeing (which had helped pay for the engineering building that had been occupied) while claiming that UW is “a direct partner in the genocide people through its allegiance to its partnership with Boeing.” ²¹