New York’s Columbia University says enough is enough as cops move in

Dozens of police ­flooded ­Columbia University’s campus in the heart of New York on Tuesday night to clear a building ­occupied by pro-Palestinian student protesters and detain demonstrators.

NYPD officers use a laddered truck to break into Columbia University’s Hamilton Hall via a second-floor window on Tuesday night. Picture: AFP

Dozens of police ­flooded ­Columbia University’s campus in the heart of New York on Tuesday night to clear a building ­occupied by pro-Palestinian student protesters and detain demonstrators.

Police climbed into Hamilton Hall via a second-floor window they reached from a laddered truck, before leading handcuffed students out of the building into police vans.

The hall had been occupied at dawn by demonstrators who vowed they would fight any eviction, as they protested the soaring death toll from Israel’s war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

The action came as university administrators across the US have struggled for weeks to contain pro-Palestinian demonstrations on dozens of campuses.

A student is led away by police from Hamilton Hall. Picture: AFP

In a letter addressed to the New York Police Department, Columbia University president Minouche Shafik said the occupation of the building was being led by “individuals who are not ­affiliated with the university” and asked “NYPD’s help to clear all individuals from Hamilton Hall and all campus encampments”.

She also asked the police to ­remain on campus until at least May 17 “to ensure encampments are not re-established”.

Writing on Instagram, the protests slammed Baroness Shafik’s statement, saying “her use of the words ‘care’ and ‘safety’ are nothing short of horrifying”.

NYPD sbreach Hamilton Hall where demonstrators barricaded themselves inside on the Columbia University campus. Picture: AFP

The weeks of demonstrations – the most sweeping and prolonged unrest to rock US college campuses since the Vietnam War protests of the 1960s and 70s – have led to several hundred ­arrests of students and other ­activists. Many of them have vowed to maintain their actions despite suspensions and threats of expulsion.

Earlier, protesters at Columbia were seen using ropes to hoist crates of supplies up to the building’s second floor, apparently signalling the students had planned to remain for as long as possible.

The White House had sharply criticised the seizure of Hamilton Hall, with a spokesman saying it was “absolutely the wrong ­approach”. “That is not an example of peaceful protest,” the spokesman added.

The protests, with Columbia at their epicentre, have posed a challenge to university administrators trying to balance free speech rights with complaints that the rallies have veered into anti-Semitism and hate. The unrest has swept through US higher education institutions like wildfire, with many student protesters erecting tent encampments on campuses from coast to coast.

NYPD officers in riot gear break into Hamilton Hall. Picture: AFP

At Columbia, demonstrators have vowed to remain until their demands are met, including that the university divest all financial holdings linked to Israel. The university has rejected the demand.

In one of the latest clashes, at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, police moved in on Tuesday to clear one encampment, detaining some protesters in a tense showdown.

Meanwhile at northern California’s Cal Poly Humboldt, a week-long occupation was brought to a dramatic end early on Tuesday when police moved in to arrest nearly three dozen protesters who had seized buildings and forced the closure of the campus.

In Oregon, Portland State University’s campus was closed on Tuesday “due to an ongoing incident” in the library, college authorities said, after local media reported about 50 protesters had broken into the building a day earlier.

Student protesters pull a crate with pizza boxes inside from a balcony in Hamilton Hall at Columbia University on Tuesday. Picture: AFP

And Brown University reached an agreement in which student protesters will remove their encampment in exchange for the institution holding a vote on divesting from Israel – a major concession from an elite American university during the protests.

Footage of police in riot gear summoned at various colleges has been viewed around the world.

UN human rights chief Volker Turk voiced concern at the heavy-handed steps taken to disperse the campus protests, saying “freedom of expression and the right to peaceful assembly are fundamental to society”. He added that “incitement to violence or hatred on grounds of identity or viewpoints – whether real or assumed – must be strongly repudiated”.

Baroness Shafik said many Jewish students had fled Columbia’s campus in fear. “Anti-­Semitic language and actions are unacceptable,” she said.

AFP