Freedom of speech, expression ‘supposed to be prized’ in US: Columbia student
A Columbia University student spoke to Al Jazeera’s correspondent Teresa Bo outside the campus about the events that led to the latest police incursion.
“A lot of students went into Hamilton Hall yesterday and occupied and [renamed] it as Hind’s Hall,” said the student who did not want to be identified by name.
“They were there all day long. All of us were hoping that the administration would behave like adults and negotiate in good faith with the students and find a compromise, find a way forward to get these students safely back to their classes where they belong.
“But a lot of us were very disappointed, obviously, and shocked, to see the police return to our campus – an American institution where freedom of speech and freedom of expression are supposed to be prized.
“Earlier today, via social networks, we were told that they expected the police to come so we came out here to demonstrate our support [for the student protesters], and for me personally for the American values that I believe in.
“I’m horrified by the decision-making process here. This isn’t Moscow. This isn’t Tehran. This is New York City. We should be able to protest peacefully.”
Members of the New York Police Department strategic response team move towards an entrance to Columbia University, on Tuesday night
Handling of Columbia protests a ‘betrayal’ of university’s history, memory of Edward Said
A graduate of Columbia told Al Jazeera’s correspondent Kristen Saloomey that the administration’s handling of the student protests was a betrayal of the university’s history and one of its finest scholars – the late Edward Said.
“Columbia is the university of Edward Said – a great scholar of Palestinian history and its people,” the student, who only gave his name as Henry, told Al Jazeera. “That’s a history that has been totally betrayed by the university.
“And it was betrayed before. In 2019, the students voted overwhelmingly for divestment. “We were told the university doesn’t get involved in politics.
“To me, this is politics [the police action against protesters]. “The Tel Aviv Global Centre [a Columbia research hub in Israel] is politics.
“The fact that there are students here who can’t participate in the full breadth of what Columbia offers because they partner with a country with race laws, with apartheid – a well-established fact – that, to me, is despicable.
“I didn’t like the old administration. I definitely don’t like how [Columbia’s President Nemat Minouche Shafik] is handling this.”
Members of the New York Police Department strategic response team load arrested protesters from Columbia University onto a bus in New York on Tuesday night
Columbia president asks police to remain on campus until May 17: Report
Nemat Minouche Shafik, the president of Columbia University, has asked New York police to remain on the university’s campus until May 17 to “ensure encampments are not reestablished”, the AFP news agency is reporting.
Students previously re-established their Gaza Solidarity encampment on the lawns of Columbia University after it was dismantled by police on April 18, in a move that saw about 100 arrests and spurred a protest movement across many other US universities.
Trump praises police operation against protesters at Columbia University
The Associated Press news agency reports that former US President Donald Trump called in live by phone to a show on Fox News to praise the police operation against pro-Palestinian protesters at Columbia University.
As the station broadcast live footage of police clearing Hamilton Hall at the university, Trump said the police raid should have come sooner.
“But it should never have gotten to this,” he told a Fox host. “They should have done it a lot sooner than before they took over the building because it would have been a lot easier if they were in tents rather than a building. And tremendous damage done, too.”
New York Police Department officers in riot gear break into a building at Columbia University, where pro-Palestinian students were barricaded, in New York City on April 30
Dozens arrested, loaded onto police buses, at Columbia University
We’ve been reporting on police entering Columbia University to dismantle a pro-Palestinian protest there.
Al Jazeera’s Teresa Bo, who is at Columbia University, says police are saying that at least 50 people have been arrested, with the students taken away in two police buses.
Students being taken away from Columbia university in an NYPD police bus
The USA has gone off the deep end. This is not the behavior of a democratic free country.
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