18 of 20 EUR students recovered from Israel, ‘all students are safe’

Eighteen EUR students on exchange in Israel, have returned to the Netherlands. Two other EUR students are still in Israel, but are safe, a spokesperson for the university said.

“It is terrible to see the level of violence and the large number of civilian casualties it has caused already. And the terrible thing is that there seems to be no end in sight. Still, we hope that the hostilities will end soon”, a message from university on the intranet read.

Due to the chaotic situation in Israel, it was not known until Friday afternoon whether the students had already left the country on one of the repatriation flights. To get them to a safe place, the university worked with a variety of organisations involved.

Living Room

The university will open its Living Room doors at 2pm on Thursday for students and staff to share their experiences and feelings about the situation in Israel. People can also report to Safe@EUR if they need assistance. The university calls on everyone to pay attention and respect each other’s feelings, to listen and try to understand. “Calls for discrimination, hatred and intolerance are not acceptable to us,” the message read.

According to an anonymous source, at least one EUR student travelled to Israel to join the Israeli army. Whether more students have taken this trip is not known to EM.