At Yale University on Monday, hours after Columbia University suspended in-person courses to defuse tensions on its New York campus after police cracked down on a tent encampment last week, scores of individuals were arrested during a pro-Palestinian march.
Video footage posted on social media shows that protesters on Monday obstructed traffic outside Yale’s campus in New Haven, Connecticut, demanding the university withdraw from manufacturers of military weapons. This led to police making arrests.
Police reportedly arrested about forty persons, according to the student-run news website Yale Daily News. Officials from Yale University could not be reached for comment.
Protests broke out at Yale, Columbia, and other colleges around the country in response to the most recent intensification of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with a deadly cross-border raid by Hamas Islamist militants and Israel’s fierce response in the Gaza enclave controlled by Hamas.
After October 7, human rights groups have noted a broad increase in prejudice and hatred directed towards Muslims, Arabs, and Jews. Since the Jewish festival of Passover began on Monday, there has been especially cause for concern in recent days.
Nemat Minouche Shafik, the president of Columbia University, announced in a statement on Monday that classes will not be held in person. She also decried antisemitic remarks and acts of intimidation and harassment that she claimed had lately taken place on campus.
Following the arrest of over 100 protestors, some of whom erected dozens of tents in what the school claimed was an unlawful demonstration that interfered with school operations, the decision was made to cancel classes on the New York campus.
“Those who are not affiliated with Columbia who have come to campus to pursue their own agendas have exploited and amplified these tensions,” stated Shafik, who last week testified before a U.S. House of Representatives committee in support of the university’s response to protesters’ alleged antisemitism. “A reset is necessary.”
Pro-Palestinian camps of a similar nature were also established at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in nearby Cambridge and Emerson College in Boston.
In a statement released on Sunday, President Joe Biden stated that his administration has committed the whole weight of the federal government to defending the Jewish community.
“We’ve even witnessed calls for violence against Jews and harassment of them in recent days. There is no place for this disgusting and dangerous overt antisemitism on college campuses or anywhere in our country,” he said.
Columbia University’s Orthodox rabbi, Elie Buechler, has warned Jewish students that campus and city police cannot guarantee their safety. He advised students to return home and remain there until the situation improves. Student organizers from the Columbia University encampment criticized the White House’s claims of antisemitism in pro-Palestinian protests, claiming they were misidentified and that some “inflammatory individuals” did not represent their movement. They demanded the school divest from corporations profiting from Israel’s actions in Gaza, transparency of the school’s financial investments, and amnesty for students and faculty disciplined over their calls for Palestinian liberation. Columbia University officials were unavailable for comment.
(Reuters)
