Israel Divestment Gets Thumbs Down from Princeton Resources Committee

Princeton Resources Committee Chair John Groves announced Wednesday that the committee will not recommend divestment or dissociation from Israel to the University’s Board of Trustees. Groves wrote an opinion piece for The Daily Princetonian to explain the committee’s process and its decision, and the committee published a four-page report on its website.

The divestment proposal was submitted in June by a coalition called Princeton Israeli Apartheid Divest (PIAD). The 66-page document called on Princeton to divest from entities that “enable or facilitate human rights violations or violations of international law as part of Israel’s illegal occupations, apartheid practices, and plausible acts of genocide.”

PIAD did not immediately respond on its social media accounts to the announcement.

The Resources Committee of the Council of the Princeton University Community reviews issues related to University finances, including proposals for divestment of endowment assets. Divestment reviews are based on criteria set by the Board of Trustees in 1997, including “sustained campus interest,” a “central University value” at stake, and community consensus.

On the issue of consensus, Groves wrote in the Prince that it was “plainly evident from the comments and materials submitted to our committee that there are multiple, divergent, and strongly held views in our community about the topics raised in the dissociation petition.”

“Without the possibility of consensus, there can be no divestment and dissociation at Princeton, and the feedback we received made it plain that our community is sharply and inexorably divided on this topic,” Groves wrote.

According to the committee’s report, what “became evident” was “that both supporters and opponents of dissociation stood firm in their commitments.”

In Groves’ piece in the Prince, he announced that the committee would not be releasing emails it received or notes they took at meetings.

“While our report strives for maximum transparency,” he wrote, “we offered confidentiality to the community to encourage input, and we must respect that promise.”

In the past, the University has repeatedly emphasized the high bar for divestment, most recently with regard to fossil fuel investments. The Resources Committee made recommendations for dissociation from specific segments of the fossil fuel industry in May 2021; the Board of Trustees accepted and expanded those recommendations in September 2022, directing the Princeton University Investment Co. to eliminate holdings in publicly traded fossil fuel companies.