New York City police officers surged onto Columbia University’s campus late on Tuesday, breaking up an escalating protest and arresting pro-Palestinian demonstrators who had barricaded themselves in a building.
Live television broadcasts showed officers entering Hamilton Hall, the latest focal point of the protest, which had been occupied by demonstrators early on Tuesday. Dozens of people have been detained and loaded into buses, CNN reported.
Columbia president Minouche Shafik said she asked police to clear all protest encampments and maintain a campus presence through at least May 17.
Photo: EPA-EFE
At about 11:40pm, Columbia personnel took down tents and removed supplies from the main encampment, the Columbia Daily Spectator reported.
The police action capped two weeks of rising tensions at Columbia, punctuated by more than 100 arrests on April 18 and subsequent protests that culminated with the takeover of Hamilton Hall. The activists have condemned the Israeli military campaign in Gaza that the Hamas-run health ministry says has left more than 34,000 people dead, and are calling for the university to divest from companies that are supplying weapons to Israel.
The earlier clash on the school’s New York City campus helped inspire protests at other colleges in the country, sparking recriminations and drawing in everyone from students to faculty and billionaire donors to politicians.
Columbia in a statement late on Tuesday said that the New York Police Department (NYPD) was brought in shortly after 9pm to restore order and ensure the safety of the campus community.
“After the university learned overnight that Hamilton Hall had been occupied, vandalized, and blockaded, we were left with no choice,” a spokesman for the school said. “Columbia public safety personnel were forced out of the building, and a member of our facilities team was threatened. We will not risk the safety of our community or the potential for further escalation.”
In a letter to Michael Gerber, NYPD Deputy Commissioner for Legal Matters, Shafik asked the police to clear all individuals not just from Hamilton Hall but also from campus encampments.
She also requested a police presence on campus through at least May 17 to “maintain order and ensure encampments are not re-established.”
The university’s commencement is scheduled for May 15.
In the letter, Shafik said that the decision to call on the police was made with the support of the university’s trustees after determining “that the building occupation, the encampments, and related disruptions pose a clear and present danger to persons, property, and the substantial functioning of the university.”
Farther uptown, police made arrests outside City College of New York, dispersing protesters and erecting steel barricades in the area.
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