New York - On Thursday, April 18, 2024, students, alumni and staff took the South lawn of Columbia University to create the Gaza Solidarity Encampment. That same day, the administration of the university called the NY police in to clear the encampment resulting in over 100 arrests. Observers and supporters of the protest spontaneously organized a second encampment on the opposite lawn that eventually became bigger than the first one and has entered its seventh day of occupation.
Over the weekend, other universities such as NYU, The New School, Yale, MIT, Tufts, Vanderbilt, and University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Cal Poly Humboldt began solidarity protests and encampments.
On Day 6 of the encampment, the administration of the Columbia University cancelled in person classes as the protests continue at the University. Only online classes are being held.
On day 6, April 22, 2024, students and faculty at Columbia University walked out to demand amnesty for student and faculty protesters. Faculty and students gave speeches against the police violence, the repression of freedom of speech, and the suspensions of students and faculty arrested.
Students, alumni and faculty were joined by protesters in New York to demand a ceasefire and the stop of killings of Palestinian people. Protesters in New York faced an increase violence against them, not comparable to that one faced by students.
On day 7, the Columbia University Gaza Solidarity Encampment is still alive and students have called a press conference in front of the President Minouche Shafik's mansion.
In the meantime, police force, repression and arrests have also taken place at other universities across the United States.
In the meantime, mainstream news inform of Anti-Israeli protests with high levels of anti-semitism at Columbia University. According to these news reports, Jewish and Pro-Israelis students, alumni and faculty fear for their safety and are being warned to stay away from campus. The President of Columbia University, Minouche Shafik, claimed an unsafe atmosphere. Such information contradicted the statements of the police that cleared the encampment and arrested students. It also contradicts the increasing support for the cause by alumni and faculty and even by personalities such as Susan Sarandon and Cornell West.
Recently mainstream media started to bring forward the voices of rich donators to Columbia University who threaten to stop funding the university due to the protests.
The worry of Columbia University is the upcoming graduation ceremonies. The worry of the protestors is the responsibility of the university's and government's involvement in the killings of Palestinian lives as well as the increasing repression of freedom of speech and the controls within the Universities' spaces.
Columbia University has a long history of campus protests
1968 remains a year of historical student protests at Columbia University against the university's involvement in the Vietnam war and the construction of a gym in Harlem that would segregate between students and local residents. Activist students called it the "Gym Crow". To know more about the 1968's campus protests at Columbia University:
- Why did Columbia University students protest in 1968?
Brief video explaining in 5 minutes the context, the causes, the development and aftermath of the student protests. Published by History on 2018.
Online exhibition based upon a physical exhibition of the same name which was on display in the Rare Book and Manuscript Library from March 17 to August 1, 2008 of the Columbia University Libraries.
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