Columbia cancels in-person classes as pro-Palestinian protests erupt on US campuses

NEW YORK (AP) Columbia canceled in-person classes, dozens of protesters were arrested at Yale and the gates of Harvard Yard were closed to the public Monday as some of America's most prestigious universities sought to ease tensions over campuses linked to the war between Israel and Hamas. .

The various actions follow last week's arrest of more than 100 pro-Palestinian protesters camped on Columbia Green, as schools grapple with where to draw the line between allowing free speech and maintaining a safe campus and inclusive.

READ MORE: Tens of thousands have joined pro-Palestinian protests across the United States. Experts say they're growing

In addition to protests at Ivy League schools, pro-Palestinian encampments have sprung up on other campuses, including at the University of Michigan, New York University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The protests have pitted students against each other, with pro-Palestinian students demanding that their schools condemn the Israeli attack on Gaza and divest from companies that sell weapons to Israel. Some Jewish students, meanwhile, say much of the criticism of Israel has veered into anti-Semitism and put them in danger, and point out that Hamas still holds hostages taken during the invasion of the group on October 7.

Tensions remained high Monday in Columbia, New York, where campus gates were closed to anyone without a school ID and protests broke out both on and off campus.

U.S. Rep. Kathy Manning, a North Carolina Democrat who was visiting Columbia with three other Jewish members of Congress to see the camp, told reporters after meeting with students from the Jewish Law Students Association that there was “a huge camp of people” that had taken up about a third of the green.

“We saw signs that Israel should be destroyed,” she said after leaving the Morningside Heights campus. A woman inside the campus gates led about two dozen protesters into the street chanting: “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free!” » a loaded phrase that can mean very different things depending on the group. Meanwhile, a small group of pro-Israel counter-protesters demonstrated nearby.

University President Minouche Shafik said in a message to the school community Monday that she was “deeply saddened” by what was happening on campus.

“To ease hard feelings and give us all a chance to consider next steps, I am announcing that all classes will be held virtually on Monday,” Shafik wrote, noting that faculty and staff should work remotely when possible. possible and that students who do not do so. living on campus should stay away.

Police officers stand in front of the entrance to Columbia University occupied by pro-Palestinian protesters, April 22, 2024. Photo by CHARLY TRIBALLEAU/ AFP via Getty Images

Protests have rocked many college campuses since Hamas' deadly attack on southern Israel, when militants killed about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took about 250 hostages. In response, Israel has killed more than 34,000 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, according to the local Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between combatants and non-combatants but says at least two-thirds of the deaths are children and women.

Prahlad Iyengar, an MIT graduate student studying electrical engineering, was among about 20 students who set up a tent encampment on the school's campus in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on Sunday evening. They are calling for a ceasefire and protesting what they describe as “MIT's complicity in the ongoing genocide in Gaza,” he said.

“MIT hasn't even called for a ceasefire, and that's a demand we certainly have,” Iyengar said.

He also said MIT had issued confusing rules regarding protests.

“We are here to demonstrate that we reserve the right to protest. It’s an essential part of life on a college campus,” Iyengar said.

On Sunday, Elie Buechler, rabbi of the Orthodox Union Jewish Learning Initiative in Columbia, sent a WhatsApp message to nearly 300 Jewish students recommending that they return home until it was safer to them on campus.

The latest developments took place before the start of the Jewish holiday of Passover on Monday evening.

Nicholas Baum, a 19-year-old Jewish freshman who lives in a Jewish theological seminary two blocks from Columbia's Morningside Heights campus, said the weekend protesters were “calling on Hamas to blow up Tel Aviv and Israel. He said some of the protesters shouting anti-Semitic slurs were not students.

“Jews are afraid in Columbia. It's that simple. There has been so much defamation of Zionism, and it has spilled over into the defamation of Judaism,” he said.

The protest encampment sprang up in Columbia on Wednesday, the same day Shafik faced harsh criticism at a congressional hearing from Republicans who said she had not done enough to fight anti-Semitism. Two other Ivy League presidents resigned months ago following widely criticized testimony they gave before the same commission.

In her statement Monday, Shafik said the conflict in the Middle East was terrible and that she understood that many people were experiencing deep moral distress.

“But we cannot let one group dictate its terms and attempt to disrupt important milestones like graduation to advance its point of view,” Shafik wrote.

Over the next few days, a task force of deans, school administrators and professors will try to find a solution to the academic crisis, noted Shafik, who did not say when in-person classes would resume.

Several students at Columbia and its sister school, Barnard College, said they were suspended for participating in last week's protests, including Barnard student Isra Hirsi, the daughter of Democratic U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar.

At Yale, officers arrested about 45 protesters and charged them with misdemeanor trespassing, said Officer Christian Bruckhart, a New Haven police spokesman. All were released on a promise to appear in court at a later date, he said.

Protesters set up tents in Beinecke Plaza on Friday and demonstrated throughout the weekend, calling on Yale to end all investment in defense companies that do business with Israel.

Nadine Cubeisy, a student at Yale and one of the organizers of the protest, said it was concerning that “this university that I go to, that I contribute to, and that my friends give money to is using that money to fund violence “.

In a statement to the campus community Sunday, Yale President Peter Salovey said university officials had repeatedly spoken to student protesters about the school's policies and guidelines, including those regarding speech and authorization of access to campus spaces.

School officials said they spoke with the protesters for several hours and gave them until the end of the weekend to leave Beinecke Plaza. They said they warned protesters again Monday morning and told them they risked arrest and punishment, or even suspension, before police intervened.

A large group of protesters gathered after Monday's arrests at Yale and blocked a street near the campus, Bruckhart said. No cases of violence or injuries were reported.

Last week, the University of Southern California took the unusual step of canceling a planned commencement address by its 2024 valedictorian, who had publicly supported the Palestinians. The university cited security concerns in a move praised by some pro-Israel groups but criticized by free speech advocates.

Perry reported from Meredith, New Hampshire, and Collins reported from Hartford, Connecticut. Associated Press writers Steve LeBlanc in Boston and Susan Haigh in Hartford contributed to this report.

Emerson College students who support the Palestinians sleep in tents at an encampment they set up in an alley on Boylston Street in Boston on April 22, 2024. US photo by JOSEPH PREZIOSO/AFP via Getty Images

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