100+ arrested in day of unrest, mass protest at Columbia University over Gaza, Israel

• Published date: 19 April 2024
• Author: LUKE TRESS/JTA
• Publication title: Jerusalem Post, The: Web Edition Articles (Israel)

The mass demonstration at New York City's Ivy League school and its aftermath represented an escalation after months of tensions over the war. On Wednesday morning, students awoke to an encampment of large green and white tents in two concentric circles covered a large portion of the campus' central quad, opposite the library

A banner hung across several of them: "GAZA SOLIDARITY ENCAMPMENT," it said. Another declared the encampment a "LIBERATED ZONE."

One day later, the tents were gone, several students — including the daughter of Rep. Ilhan Omar, one of Israel's biggest critics in Congress — had been suspended and more than 100 others were detained and loaded into police vans lining the university's main entrance on Broadway.

Columbia President Minouche Shafik, who had just returned from testifying in Congress about the campus climate, had written a letter to the NYPD calling the encampment "a clear and present danger" to the university's operations.

She added, "With great regret, we request the NYPD's help to remove these individuals."

New York City Mayor Eric Adams said at a Thursday press conference that there had been more than 108 arrests. Police officials at the briefing said the suspects had been issued summonses for trespassing, and two were also charged with obstruction of governmental administration.

"Columbia University's students have a proud history of protest and raising their voices. Students have a right to free speech but do not have a right to violate university policies and disrupt learning," Adams said. "We will not be a city of lawlessness."

The activists who set up the encampment belonged to Columbia University Apartheid Divest, a pro-Palestinian coalition of student groups that has been at the forefront of frequent demonstrations and disruptive actions on campus. This action, which was far more extensive than past protests, called on Columbia to divest from Israel and was timed to Shafik's congressional testimony.

"Those of us in Gaza Solidarity Encampment will not be intimidated," one of the protesters, Isra Hirsi, wrote on social media. 'We will stand resolute until our demands are met."

Hirsi is the daughter of Omar, the Minnesota Democrat. She posted on Thursday that she had been suspended from Barnard, the women's college affiliated with Columbia. Police officials confirmed her arrest and said she had been issued a summons for trespassing.

A hotspot of protest

Columbia has been a hotspot of protest over the war since October...