Columbia anti-Israeli protest leader banned from campus, 550 arrested across US
By Pooja Sood | Published | No Comments
A video showing an anti-Israeli protest leader saying that Zionists “don’t deserve to live” and should be killed fuelled the protests at Columbia University. Meanwhile, students who inspired pro-Palestinian demonstrations across the country, have said they reached an impasse with administrators and intend to continue their encampment until their demands are met.
As the death toll mounts in the war in Gaza and the humanitarian crisis worsens, protesters at universities across the country are demanding that schools cut financial ties to Israel and divest from companies they say are enabling the conflict. Some Jewish students say the protests have veered into antisemitism and made them afraid to set foot on campus.
PRO-PALESTINE PROTESTS ACROSS US UNIVERSITIES: THE LATEST
Khymani James, one of the leaders of the anti-Israeli protests at Columbia University, was banned from campus after a video showing him saying repeatedly and emphatically that Zionists “don’t deserve to live” and should be killed. Later, a leader of students protesting the war in Gaza at Columbia University apologised, while 20-year-old James said he was “unusually upset” and “misspoke in the heat of the moment”.
A total of 550 anti-Israeli protesters have so far been arrested from across the United States, as the police used chemical irritants and tasers to disperse protests over Israel’s war with Hamas. The office of New York-based Columbia University president Minouche Shafik issued a statement retreating from a midnight deadline to dismantle a large tent camp with around 200 students.
On Friday, Columbia University’s embattled president came under renewed pressure as a campus oversight panel sharply criticised her administration for clamping down on a pro-Palestinian protest at the Ivy League school. President Nemat Minouche Shafik has faced an outcry from many students, faculty and outside observers for summoning New York police to dismantle a tent encampment set up on campus by protesters against Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza.
The president of the University of Texas at Austin, Jay Hartzell, faced a similar backlash from faculty after he joined with Republican Governor Greg Abbott in calling on the police to break up a pro-Palestinian protest. Later, nearly 200 members of the faculty at the university signed a letter, saying they had no confidence in Hartzell after he “needlessly put students, staff and faculty in danger” when hundreds of officers clad in riot gear and on horseback swept away the protests.
Students on Friday blocked access to Paris’ prestigious Sciences Po university over the war in Gaza, demanding the institution condemn Israel’s actions, in a protest that echoed similar demonstrations on US campuses. Chanting their support for the Palestinians, the students displayed Palestinian flags at windows and over the building’s entrance. Several wore the black-and-white keffiyeh headscarf that has become an emblem of solidarity with Gaza.
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