2024-04-26 07:34:12
Columbia University in New York has shelved an ultimatum that protesting pro-Palestinian students had until midnight tonight to vacate the campus. According to AFP, this was reported by the management of the university, whose students started a nationwide wave of university protests, which led to clashes with the police and the arrest of dozens of people. The university said negotiations with the students had made progress.
American universities have been the scene of protests since the start of the war in Gaza last October. But in recent days, tensions have escalated after Columbia University officials called the police on their students who had camped out in the middle of the Manhattan campus. Similar protest camps have sprung up across the country, and media reports say the events are attracting activists from outside, who continue to stoke passions.
Students have refused to leave the New York campus for the tenth day and continued their protests into the night of today, when the original ultimatum the university gave them to vacate the space expired. However, students with protest banners dispersed at night when about four dozen police officers arrived at the scene, the AP reported.
“Negotiations have progressed and are continuing as expected,” the university’s management said today, according to AFP.
The campus demonstrations reflect strong disapproval among young Americans of the way Israel is waging war in Gaza against the terrorist group Hamas. The protesting students are demanding that the schools cut off business ties and investments that are in any way connected to Israel, and are calling for an end to the killing of Palestinian civilians. According to critics, the protests are accompanied by manifestations of anti-Semitism and intimidation of Jewish students.
Huge hate, criticizes Trump students
According to press agencies, former US President Donald Trump also criticized the pro-Palestinian demonstrations at American universities. He claimed, among other things, that the infamous far-right rally in Charlottesville in 2017 was “nothing” compared to the “level of hatred” in current events.
“Charlottesville was nothing compared to the level of hate that you have here, it’s massive hate,” said the former president, who is running for re-election to the White House.
In August 2017, hundreds of right-wing extremists and white supremacists descended on Charlottesville to protest City Hall’s plan to remove a statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee. Among the participants at the time were known Holocaust deniers, anti-Semites, Ku Klux Klan supporters, some people wore Nazi symbols, and many of them had Confederate flags, which the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) considers a hate symbol.
Protesters clashed with opponents of the far-right rally, and the images from Charlottesville shocked the American public. One of the radicals drove a car into the peaceful opponents of the assembly. He killed a young woman and injured nearly two dozen other people. A self-proclaimed admirer of Adolf Hitler, a car driver is now serving a life sentence for murder and hate crimes.
According to a number of media outlets, the situation at the time was exacerbated by then-President Trump when he declared that there were “good people” on both sides of the dispute and criticized “violence on both sides”, which led to Trump being accused of making concessions to the far right.
Video: Demonstrations in support of the Palestinians begin around the world after the Hamas attack on Israel (October 9, 2023)
After the Hamas attack on Israel, the world begins to demonstrate in support of the Palestinians | Video: Reuters