In a statement, the movement Students of Porto in Defense of Palestine appealed to UPorto to "promote the immediate severance of its relations with Israeli institutions [and] condemn the ongoing genocide in Palestine".

The group also asked that UPorto "recognize the Palestinian people's right to self-determination and return" and use its "influence to pressure the CMP [Porto City Council] and the Portuguese government to break diplomatic ties with Israel".

The statement came hours after pro-Palestine demonstrators interrupted a debate with the president of the European Investment Bank (EIB), Nádia Calviño, organized by UPorto on Friday, questioning the bank's funding of Israel and shouting slogans.

One of the young women, who identified herself as a UPorto student, questioned the EIB president about potential funding for Israel, then shouted, along with other young people, "Free Palestine" several times.

The young people also displayed posters, one of which read that "the invisible hand of genocide has the fingerprint of the EIB".

The demonstrators were removed by security from the UPorto Faculty of Economics, where the debate was taking place.

In the statement, the Students of Porto in Defense of Palestine movement recalled that the EIB currently maintains 32 investment projects in Israel, with a cumulative value of three billion euros since 1981.

"The investments made by the EIB constitute an active contribution to the ongoing ethnic cleansing in Palestine", the group said.

The movement gave as an example the funding, in the amount of "hundreds of millions of euros" to Israeli companies "that promote the desalination of Palestinian water resources".

"Access to these resources is then guaranteed by belonging to a certain ethnic group, in a regime of racial segregation known as apartheid", the statement stressed.

The result, the group said, is that the population of the Gaza Strip has access to only "two/three liters" of drinking water per day, far from the recommendation of the World Health Organization, "thus creating successive humanitarian crises".

"The academic and student community, as well as various civil society movements, repudiate these links, established between the European project and the genocide perpetrated by Israel", the movement concluded.

On Wednesday, a group of 65 UPorto teachers and researchers demanded that the academy have no relationship with the State of Israel or with Israeli companies and institutions involved in the war against the Palestinian people.

Also Read: Pro-Palestine demonstrators interrupt debate with EIB president in Porto (Portuguese version)