'We tried every other tactic' University students on why they joined demonstrations

After going on hunger strike in February, Amine ended up spending six days in hospital. The 25-year-old McGill student, who was born in Morocco, did not eat for a total of 34 days: part of a relay system of hunger strikes that is continuing at the university.

Rania Amine

"I definitely experienced physical symptoms, but it was nothing compared with what we know that people in Gaza are going through every day," Amine said.

"It's been a while now that I've been out of the hospital. In terms of my physical health, I've recovered, there's nothing that I know of that is problematic. But the mental health toll is very real." Since October students at McGill, in Montreal, Canada, have held rallies and protests calling for the school to divest from companies that supply weapons and other items to Israel's military. Documents on McGill's website show that it holds investments in companies including Lockheed Martin, a US defence contractor that has sold fighter jets to Israel, and Safran, a French aviation and defence company.

Amine compared the student protests with anti-apartheid movements on campuses in the 1980s, which eventually led to many universities divesting from companies that operated in South Africa.

"When you see the students rise up, that's when you know that something has to change, and things will change," she said.

Catherine Elias 

"I went to Palestine to teach English in one of the refugee camps when I was 19 years old, over a summer break.

"And I think that was a really transformational experience for me," said Elias, a student at Columbia University in New York who is of Lebanese-Irish heritage.

"It was a radically different perspective to see it firsthand: to witness the checkpoints, to witness the violence, to witness just the pure atrocity that is Palestinians living under occupation every day." Elias spent five years living and working in the occupied territories before moving to New York last year.