Columbia University suspending student protesters after encampment talks break down

NEW YORK — Columbia University on April 29 began suspending pro-Palestinian student activists who refused to disband an encampment of tents on its New York campus after the Ivy League school declared a stalemate in talks seeking to end the polarising protest.

University president Nemat Minouche Shafik said in a statement that days of negotiations between student organisers and academic leaders had failed to persuade demonstrators to dismantle the dozens of tents they set up to express opposition to Israel's war in Gaza.

The university sent protesters a letter in the morning on April 29 warning that students who did not vacate the encampment by 2pm (2am Singapore time on April 30) and sign a form acknowledging their participation would face suspension and become ineligible to complete the semester in good standing.

"We have begun suspending students as part of this next phase of our efforts to ensure safety on our campus," said Ben Chang, a university spokesman, at a briefing in the evening on April 29.

In her earlier statement, Shafik said Columbia would not divest assets that support Israel's military, a key demand of the protesters. Instead, she offered to invest in health and education in Gaza, and to make Columbia's direct investment holdings more transparent.

Protesters have vowed to keep their encampment on the Manhattan campus until Columbia meets three demands: divestment, transparency in university finances, and amnesty for students and faculty members disciplined for their part in the protests.

"These repulsive scare tactics mean nothing compared to the deaths of over 34,000 Palestinians. We will not move until Columbia meets our demands or we are moved by force," leaders of the Columbia Student Apartheid Divest coalition said in a statement read at a news conference following the deadline.

Hundreds of demonstrators, many wearing traditional Palestinian keffiyeh scarves, marched in circles around the exterior of the encampment chanting, "Disclose! Divest! We will not stop, we will not rest".

Shafik faced an outcry from many students, faculty members and outside observers for summoning New York City police two weeks ago to dismantle the encampment.

Even though more than 100 arrests were made, students restored the encampment on a hedge-lined lawn of the university grounds within days of the April 18 police action.

Since then, students at dozens of campuses from California to New England have set up similar encampments to demonstrate their anger over the Israeli operation in Gaza and the perceived complicity of their schools in it.

The pro-Palestinian rallies have sparked intense campus debate over where school officials should draw the line between freedom of expression and hate speech. Some pro-Israel counter-demonstrators have accused the other side of engaging in anti-Semitism.

Those protesting against Israel's military offencive in Gaza have, in turn, asserted that their opposition to the Israeli government is being falsely equated with expressions of anti-Jewish hatred. Many Jewish students have themselves found common cause with the pro-Palestinian movement.

"The movement itself is not anti-Semitic," said Nicholas Fink, a freshman history major at Columbia who has not participated in the protests.

He is one of a few dozen Jewish students who met privately with US House Speaker Mike Johnson during a campus visit by Republican members of Congress last week. Johnson and other congressional Republicans have claimed that Columbia has turned a blind eye to anti-Semitic rhetoric and harassment on its campus.

Protest at UCLA

At the University of California, Los Angeles, where opposing sides had clashed over the weekend, pro-Israeli activists set up a large screen and loudspeakers to play a tape loop of the Oct 7 cross-border attack on Israel by Hamas militants. The video appears aimed at countering pro-Hamas chants that seeped into campus protests in support of Palestinian civilians besieged in Gaza.

UCLA also stepped up security around a pro-Palestinian encampment, consisting of more than 50 tents surrounded by metal fencing near the main administration building on campus.

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Civil rights groups have criticised law enforcement tactics on some campuses, such as Atlanta's Emory University and The University of Texas at Austin, where the police in riot gear and on horseback moved against protesters last week, taking dozens into custody before charges were dropped for lack of probable cause.

Protests, and arrests, flared anew on the Austin campus on April 29.

Virginia Tech said April 29 that 91 protesters arrested on April 28 at a student-led encampment had been charged with trespassing. Video posted on social media showed demonstrators chanting, "Shame on you" as some were taken into custody.

Similar demonstrations have sprung up at universities in other countries. Students at McGill University in Montreal, Canada, set up about 20 pro-Palestinian protest camps on April 27 demanding the university divest from companies with links to Israel.

By April 29, the number of encampments on the downtown campus had tripled, but many were not set up by members of the McGill community, according to a statement by the university.

McGill also said it was investigating what it said was video evidence of some people using "unequivocally anti-Semitic language and intimidating behaviour". Students denied the allegation.

In Paris, France, days after protests at the elite Sciences Po school, the police removed dozens of protesters who had set up tents in the yard of the Sorbonne University on April 29 to mark their anger over the war in Gaza, one of the students told Reuters.

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