{"id":201561,"date":"2025-11-26T17:33:10","date_gmt":"2025-11-26T17:33:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/201561\/"},"modified":"2025-11-26T17:33:10","modified_gmt":"2025-11-26T17:33:10","slug":"actor-declines-degree-from-university-of-galway-over-contract-link-to-israeli-tech-institute-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/201561\/","title":{"rendered":"Actor declines\u00a0degree from University of Galway over contract link to Israeli tech institute \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Actor Olwen Fou\u00e9r\u00e9 has turned down an honorary doctorate from the University of Galway<\/a> due to an \u201cextremely problematic\u201d contract linking the college to Technion, the Israel Institute of Technology.<\/p>\n

The 71-year-old actor, who was born in Galway<\/a> to French parents, has performed many celebrated roles in theatre, films and television including appearances on The Crown and Derry Girls. <\/p>\n

Ms Fou\u00e9r\u00e9 was due to receive the honorary degree at a ceremony on Thursday but has declined over the university\u2019s links to the Israeli<\/a> college and her opposition to Israel\u2019s military offensive in Gaza<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In a statement issued on Wednesday, she said she was initially \u201coverjoyed\u201d to be offered the doctorate but after \u201ca great deal of thought\u201d felt obliged to refuse it.<\/p>\n

Ms Fou\u00e9r\u00e9 said many staff and students have called for the university to cut all ties with Israeli companies, saying these demands \u201chave been met with avoidance, delay and legal obfuscation\u201d. <\/p>\n

She noted that staff at the university\u2019s Irish Centre for Human Rights have \u201cworked diligently to promote justice in Palestine and to condemn, with good academic and moral authority, the crime of genocide\u201d.<\/p>\n

In September, Prof Peter McHugh, the university\u2019s interim president at the time, said the college would not participate in any new institutional research agreements involving direct Israeli partners. <\/p>\n

However, the university confirmed it would continue its involvement as a co-ordinating partner in an existing \u20ac3.9 million research project \u2013 which is examining ways to produce hydrogen from seawater<\/a> \u2013 also involving Technion.<\/p>\n

Ms Fou\u00e9r\u00e9 said the contract in question was \u201cextremely problematic\u201d.<\/p>\n

She said Technion had trained many future Israeli military leaders and helped to develop tank and drone technologies used by the Israeli military. <\/p>\n

\"ActorActor Olwen Fou\u00e9r\u00e9 has turned down an honorary doctorate from the University of Galway. Photograph: Alan Betson <\/p>\n

[\u00a0Palestinian economy suffers collapse after Israel-Hamas conflict, UN saysOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Ms Fou\u00e9r\u00e9 said she had \u201coriginally planned to accept the honorary degree and make a statement of intent to challenge [the university\u2019s] delay in terminating the Technion contract\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cI believed that I could take on this challenge more effectively from within, as a newly conferred honorary alumni,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

However, she added that after \u201ca great deal of thought\u201d, she had \u201cregrettably come to believe that the stronger, and perhaps more visible, action is in refusing to accept an honorary degree at this moment\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would of course be more than happy to accept if and when the remaining ties with Technion were cut,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Ms Fou\u00e9r\u00e9 called on the new president of the university, Prof David Burn, and other management \u201cto fulfil the University\u2019s promise of divestment and to sever all ties with Technion and the Israeli regime\u201d.<\/p>\n

When asked about Ms Fou\u00e9r\u00e9\u2019s statement, a spokeswoman for the university said the institution \u201cremains committed to exploring ways forward in relation to the research partnership\u201d.<\/p>\n

Almost 70,000 Palestinians have been killed and more than 170,000 people injured in the last two years, according to Gaza\u2019s health ministry.<\/p>\n

Israel launched a military campaign in Gaza after Palestinian militant group Hamas led an attack on southern Israel on October 7th, 2023, killing about 1,200 people and abducting 251 hostages.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Israel receives remains of hostage held in Gaza from Red CrossOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Actor Olwen Fou\u00e9r\u00e9 has turned down an honorary doctorate from the University of Galway due to an \u201cextremely…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":201562,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[9,10,18,13,14,1878,3761,6,19,17,71,11,12,15,16,5,7,8,20351],"class_list":{"0":"post-201561","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ireland","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-eire","11":"tag-featured-news","12":"tag-featurednews","13":"tag-galway","14":"tag-gaza-strip","15":"tag-headlines","16":"tag-ie","17":"tag-ireland","18":"tag-israel","19":"tag-latest-news","20":"tag-latestnews","21":"tag-main-news","22":"tag-mainnews","23":"tag-news","24":"tag-top-stories","25":"tag-topstories","26":"tag-university-of-galway"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115617202817969061","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201561","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=201561"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201561\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/201562"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=201561"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=201561"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=201561"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}