16 Posts
Sort by
Police break up pro-Palestinian encampment at University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill
From CNN’s Dianne Gallagher and Andy Rose
Pro-Palestinian protesters at the Chapel Hill campus of the University of North Carolina (UNC) are being detained Tuesday morning after the university sent them a demand to vacate their encampment.
Video from CNN affiliate WRAL shows police moving in on the encampment, with some people being bound with zip ties. Others were being kept back from the area by a cordon of police.
UNC-Chapel Hill's interim chancellor Lee Roberts and provost Christopher Clemens said in a statement Tuesday that student protesters must leave their encampment at the Polk Place quadrangle. The statement was acknowledged by UNC Students for Justice in Palestine in a photo posted to Instagram.
UNC said in its statement: “During events in recent weeks, the student demonstrators abided by our policies. That changed Sunday evening when protesters – including outside activists – backtracked on their commitment to comply with these policies, including trespassing into classroom buildings overnight.”
The statement went on to say:
“By 6 a.m. today the protesters assembled in Polk Place must remove all tents, tables, and other items and depart from the area. Failure to follow this order to disperse will result in consequences including possible arrest, suspension from campus and, ultimately, expulsion from the university, which may prevent students from graduating.”
Campus protesters are calling for divestment. It's happened before
ByCNN's Samantha Delouya
College campuses across the United States have been roiled by pro-Palestinian protests this month, with nearly all demonstrations calling for universities to divest from Israel in some form. So far, universities have refused to yield to those demands.
What would divestment look like?
Put most simply, divestment is the opposite of investment.
Many universities have an endowment, which is donated funds generally invested in stocks, bonds and other financial instruments to help the university earn money.
At Columbia, a group of students want the college to divestits $13.6 billion endowment from any company linked to Israel, including Microsoft and Amazon. Protesters at other schools, such as Cornell and Yale, want their universities to stop investing in weapons manufacturers.
What are university officials saying?
On Monday, Columbia’s administration reiterated that it would not divest from Israel. Last week, the University of California also said divestment wouldn’t happen.
But some colleges are willing to talk with protesters.
Christina Paxson, president of Brown University, sent a letter to demonstrators saying she would agree to hear a divestment proposal if the school’s encampment were disbanded, according to the student-run newspaper, theBrown Daily Herald.
They've been here before.
Columbia students protesting South Africa's apartheid racial segregation policy in the 1980s called on the school to severe its financial ties with companies doing business in the country.
Columbia eventually voted to sell the majority of its stock in South Africa-connected companies. Other colleges followed suit.
Students hang "Intifada" banner from Hamilton Hall
From CNN's Melissa Alonso
Student protesters occupying Hamilton Hall at Columbia University have displayed banners from a window reading "Intifada," the Arabic word for an uprising, and "Hind's Hall," according to video obtained by CNN.
A student group explained in a statement that “Hind’s Hall” was in honor of Hind Rajab, a five-year-old girl from Gaza. Rajab and her relatives were found dead in January after being trapped in a car that came under Israeli fire, CNN reported.
Outside Hamilton Hall early Tuesday, students were chanting “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” and “Palestine will live forever,”the video shows.
According to the Columbia Spectator, dozens of student protesters have moved metal gates to barricade the doors to Hamilton Hall, blocking entrances with wooden tablesand zip-tying doors shut.
This post has been updated to correct the month Rajab was found dead.
Columbia University advises people to avoid its Morningside Heights campus if possible
From CNN's Melissa Alonso
Columbia University officials are advising "members of the University community" to avoid going to the Morningside campus if possible on Tuesday in light of the protesters occupying Hamilton Hall, accordingto a campus alert from Columbia Public Safety.
"Essential personnel should report to work according to university policy. Please check with your supervisor if you have any questions. Be aware that access to campus and other campus buildings may be restricted," the alert said.
Columbia's Morningside Heights campusis located at Broadway and 116th Street in Manhattan and is the main campus for the university.
White House won't say if campus protesters should face disciplinary action
From CNN's DJ Judd and Haley Talbot
The White House declined Monday to say if President Joe Biden believes that demonstrators who’ve camped out on college campuses across the country to protest the war in Gaza should face disciplinary action.
“These are institutions – some of them are private, some of them are public – and it is up to their leadership, university leadership and colleges, to make that decision,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said at a daily press briefing.
Jean-Pierre reiterated the president’s support for the right to peacefully protest while criticizing antisemitic rhetoric and calls for violence.
She also acknowledged the anguish felt by many Americans as the civilian death toll in Gaza continues to rise: “We get that it is a painful moment that Americans are dealing with, and free expression has to be done within the law.”
However, Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson indicated Friday that he would consider pulling federal funding to college campuses roiled by protests.
“We're looking at very seriously reducing or eliminating any federal funds at all to campuses who cannot maintain basic safety and security of Jewish students,” the lawmaker said in an interview with Salem news program “This Week on the Hill.”
Jewish student sues Columbia, alleging it is failing to provide a safe environment
From CNN's Matt Egan
An anonymous Jewish student alleges in a lawsuit filed Monday that Columbia University is failing to provide a safe learning environment for students during the ongoing pro-Palestinian demonstrations.
The lawsuit, which is seeking class action status, argues the university has “become a place that is too dangerous for Columbia’s Jewish students to receive the education they were promised.”
The complaint, filed against Columbia’s board of trustees in the Southern District of New York, alleges that a subset of protesters have committed acts of violence, harassed Jewish students and faculty members and incited hate speech and acts of violence.
The lawsuit includes numerous redacted sections to protect the identity of the plaintiff, who is described as a “Jewish student in her second year” and whose education has been disrupted by the hostile environment on campus.
The lawsuit takes particular issue with the decision by Columbia to go to a hybrid learning modellast weekamid the unrest on campus.
“Jewish students…get a second-class education where they are relegated to their homes to attend classes virtually and stripped of the opportunity to interact meaningfully with other students and faculty and sit for examinations with their peers,” the lawsuit said. “The segregation of Jewish students is a dangerous development that can quickly escalate into more severe acts of violence and discrimination.”
Columbia declined tocomment on the lawsuit.
The university's president Minouche Shafik acknowledged in astatementMonday that many Jewish students and other students have “found the atmosphere intolerable in recent weeks.”
“Many have left campus, and that is a tragedy. To those students and their families, I want to say to you clearly: You are a valued part of the Columbia community,” Shafik said.
At least 200 students have barricaded the entrance to Columbia's Hamilton Hall
From CNN's John Towfighi and Melissa Alonso
At least 200 student protesters at Columbia University have barricaded the entrance to Hamilton Hall and about a dozen are inside the campus building.
CNN's JohnTowfighi — a Columbia University student — said there is no visible law enforcement at the scene.
Overnight, protesters on campus made their wayfrom the West Lawn encampment to Hamilton Hall. The hall is one of the university's main academic buildings for undergraduates and is where the dean's office is located.
Aerial footage from Freedom News TV overnight showed several dozen people crowded onto the steps of Hamilton Hall. Several people could be seen inside the building and a Palestinian flag was draped out of one window.
The building is symbolic for the university. In 1968, students occupied the building while protesting the school's ties to the war in Vietnam. It was again occupied by student protestersin the 1980s as part of the South Africa Apartheid Divestment Movement.
See the aerial footage showing outside Hamilton Hall here:
Columbia University protesters say they are occupying an academic building
From CNN's Melissa Alonso and JohnTowfighi
Dozens of Columbia University students are occupying Hamilton Hall, one of the campus buildings occupied during 1968 student protests, according to a social media post early Tuesday fromColumbia Students for Justice in Palestine.
Overnight, protesters on campus made their wayfrom the West Lawn encampment to Hamilton Hall, one of the main academic buildings for undergraduates.
Hours earlier, the university announced it had begun suspending students who refused to leave the encampment before a 2 p.m. Monday deadline set by the administration.
A large group of protesters rallied in front of Hamilton Hall early Tuesday, chanting the call-and-response, "What do we want? Justice. When do we want it? Now."
Aerial footage from Freedom News TV showed several dozen people crowded onto the steps of the building. Several people can be seen inside the building and a Palestinian flag is draped out of one window.
At the nearby encampment, a line of marching protesters encircles the tent-covered lawn, appearing to form a picket line around the encampment, the footage shows.
CNN has reachedout to Columbia University and the New York Police Department for more information.
Hear from Columbia student and CNN freelancer John Towfighi:
Columbia has pushed an anti-Palestinian narrative, lead student negotiator tells CNN
From CNN's Samantha Delouya
In a conversation with CNN's Wolf Blitzer Monday, the lead negotiator for Columbia students, Mahmoud Khalil, discussed what he called an "anti-Palestinian narrative" at the school amid pro-Palestinian protests.
“Over the past six months, these students, they have witnessed the killing of over 34,000 Palestinians in Gaza and despite all of this the institution, Columbia at least, has only pushed one narrative — an anti-Palestinian narrative on campus,” Khalil said.
Khalil said Jewish students participating in the protests were an "integral" part of the demonstrations.
“I would say that the liberation of Palestine and the Palestinians and the Jewish people are intertwined. They go hand in hand. Antisemitism and any form of racism has no place on campus and in this movement,” Khalil said.
