Columbia student demands aid for protesters. Journalist says this

Hours after hundreds of pro-Palestinian protesters at Columbia University occupied Hamilton Hall on the New York City campus on Tuesday, they demanded the university authorities provide food to them. Later, one of the protesters defended the demand as a “basic humanitarian aid” so that they don’t die of starvation.

However, she was grilled by a reporter who said the students had put themselves in such a position “deliberately”.

The reporter also asked why the university should be obligated to provide food to people who have taken over the iconic building.

“We’re saying they are obligated to provide food to the students who are paying for a meal plan here,” the protester responded.

“You mentioned that there was a request that food and water be brought in,” the reporter pressed.

“To allow it to be brought in,” she said.

“I mean, well I guess it’s ultimately a question of what kind of community and obligation Columbia feels it has to its students. Do you want students to die of dehydration and starvation or get severely ill even if they disagree with you? If the answer is no, then you should allow basic—I mean it’s crazy to say because we are on an Ivy League campus, but this is like basic humanitarian aid we’re asking for. Like, could people please have a glass of water?”

Later, the reporter grilled her, saying the students had “deliberately put themselves in that position”.

“It seems like you’re saying, ‘we want to be revolutionaries, we want to take over this building, now would you please bring us some food’,” the reporter said.

“Nobody is asking them to bring anything, we’re asking them to not stop us from bringing in basic humanitarian aid,” the protester responded.

The protester was identified as Johannah King-Slutzky, who, according to the Post Millennial, has been a campus activist at least since 2021. She was with the Student Workers of Columbia and is a PhD student in English and Comparative Literature.

On Tuesday, protesters who occupied Hamilton Hall displayed banners from a window reading “Intifada,” the Arabic word for an uprising, CNN reported, citing a video.

The school said in an early morning notice that effective immediately, access to the Morningside campus had been limited to students residing in residential buildings on campus and employees providing essential services.

On Monday, the university suspended pro-Palestinian student activists who refused to dismantle a protest camp on the New York City campus after the Ivy League school declared a stalemate in talks seeking to end the demonstration.

In the latest, New York City police officers entered the grounds of Columbia University on Tuesday night in an apparent effort to disperse pro-Palestinian protesters who took over Hamilton Hall after a nearly two-week standoff with administrators of the Ivy League school.

The crackdown at Columbia, at the centre of Gaza-related protests roiling university campuses across the US in recent weeks, came as police at the University of Texas at Austin arrested dozens of students whom they doused with pepper spray at a pro-Palestinian rally.