Aletho News

Pro-Palestine rallies spread on US campuses despite heavy repression

The Cradle | April 23, 2024

Pro-Palestinian protests at major US universities continued to grow on 22 April despite arrests by police, suspensions by university administrators, and sabotage by pro-Israel lobby groups.

Columbia, a prestigious university in New York City, has been the epicenter of the student protests opposing Israel’s genocide in Gaza. The protests have now spread to other universities, including Harvard, New York University, Yale, Arizona State, and California State Polytechnic University at Humboldt.

Police have arrested dozens at Columbia and Yale for refusing to leave protest encampments after administrators demanded it.

Columbia student and protester Grant Miner told the New Statesman that the protesters’ demands include “amnesty for students who had been suspended by the administration over earlier campus protests [he being one of them]; divestment from Israeli bonds and equity; financial transparency around how the university invests its $14 billion endowment.”

The protests made headlines in the US on Monday as new mass graves were discovered outside Nasser Hospital in Gaza with over 200 civilian bodies, including doctors and nurses still wearing scrubs, as well as women, men, and children, all killed by the Israeli army.

On Monday night, police cleared a protest encampment centered at New York University’s Gould Plaza at the university’s request. Faculty and students were arrested.

The Washington Post reported that videos on social media showed “dozens of officers in tense confrontations with protesters. Some officers tossed tents, and others grappled with demonstrators. Videos also showed police loading people, whose hands were zip-tied behind their backs, onto correctional buses.”

The confrontations began after university police blocked access to the plaza Monday morning, where about 50 protesters were demonstrating “without authorization,” NYU spokesman John Beckman said.

The barriers were breached early in the afternoon by additional protesters, “many of whom we believe were not affiliated with NYU,” who exhibited “disorderly, disruptive, and antagonizing behavior” and refused to leave when told the protests would be disbanded, he said. The university then requested assistance from the [New York Police Department] NYPD, he said, adding there were “several antisemitic incidents reported.”

Last week, over 100 students at Columbia were arrested amid accusations of violence and antisemitism among protesters. NYPD Commissioner Edward Caban said: “The students that were arrested were peaceful, offered no resistance whatsoever, and were saying what they wanted to say.”

According to Grant Miner, a Jewish Columbia student, allegations of antisemitism are unfounded.

“I’m not sure what people would be referring to,” Miner said. “I myself am Jewish. The narrative is that … we’re a violent mob, and there’s been no violence here. The only anti-Jewish sentiments I’ve received are from hard-core Zionist Jews calling me a fake Jew. In fact, I got a fun email to my work email calling me, just a subject line, ‘Judenrat.’”

Journalist Max Blumenthal reported that pro-Israel lobby groups are offering “cash compensation” to young Zionists “willing to wear keffiyehs and walk in these demonstrations” as provocateurs to spread antisemitic slogans and issue threats against Jews.

On Monday, Republican Senators Tom Cotton and Josh Hawley used alleged concerns about the safety of Jewish students to demand that President Joe Biden call in the National Guard to suppress the protests at Columbia.

April 23, 2024 - Posted by aletho | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Solidarity and Activism, War Crimes | Human rights, Israel, Palestine, United States, Zionism