– New York police intervene on the campus of Columbia University
New York police intervened Tuesday evening at Columbia University to dislodge pro-Palestinian students and activists who had been barricaded in a building since the previous night.
New York Police officers arrest students at Columbia University in New York on April 30, 2024.
AFP
A police truck with a ladder approached the occupied building and the press could see dozens of police officers in riot gear climbing to reach a window to enter “Hamilton Hall” where dozens of people were holed up from the night from Monday to Tuesday.
The police entered around 9:30 p.m. (3:30 a.m. in Switzerland) on the immense campus of this large university in northern Manhattan, the epicenter of a national movement in the United States in support of the Palestinian cause and against the war that Israel is waging in the Gaza Strip against Hamas.
On their Instagram account, demonstrators from the pro-Palestinian group “Columbia University Apartheid Divest” denounced an “invasion” of the campus by the police in order to dislodge them from “Hamilton Hall” which they renamed “Hind’s Hall » in tribute to a six-year-old girl killed in Gaza.
“Escalation”
Denouncing an “escalation” on Tuesday, Columbia spokesperson Ben Chang threatened to expel and “discharge” these students from the university, accusing them of “vandalizing, breaking and blocking access” to the building.
Television images showed dozens of people arrested and AFP journalists also saw demonstrators outside the huge campus being arrested while crowds shouted “Free Palestine!”
American student anger has spread for two weeks from major universities on the east coast to those in California via the south and center, recalling the demonstrations against the Vietnam War at the end of the 1960s.
Columbia and its 37,000 students is also at the heart of the movement against Israel’s war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
A “village” of tents which sheltered up to 200 people was set up in mid-April on a campus lawn usually open to passers-by but which was completely cordoned off by the police on Tuesday, suggesting an intervention.
AFP
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