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SvennoJ on 07 May 2024
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My old university got attacked by police as well

Dutch police end pro-Palestinian demonstration at Amsterdam university

Dutch riot police have ended a pro-Palestinian demonstration at the University of Amsterdam this morning, arresting some 125 people in sometimes violent clashes, according to authorities.

In messages posted overnight on X, police said they had to act to stop the event and dismantle tents set up by protesters, who used violence against police at the site. “The police’s input was necessary to restore order. We see the footage on social media. We understand that those images may appear as intense,” police said.

Local media showed demonstrators shooting fireworks at police officers but there were no immediate reports of injuries on either side. “All is now quiet … police stay in the vicinity of the Roeterseiland campus,” police said later on X.

Not surprising, a peaceful demonstration by students I joined in The Hague 28 years ago was broken up by military police. The Netherlands has only gotten worse since then, I'm glad I left.


Israeli protesters call on Netanyahu to accept truce deal

Pressure is building on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at home, after Hamas agreed to a ceasefire proposal brokered by Qatar and Egypt. Thousands of people held demonstrations in Tel Aviv, demanding the government accept the deal and bring the captives held in Gaza back home.



Pro-Palestine campus protests spread to the Nordic countries

In Finland, dozens of protesters from the Students for Palestine solidarity group have set up an encampment outside the main building at the University of Helsinki. Demonstrators say they will stay at the site in central Helsinki until the university, which is Finland’s largest academic institution, cuts academic ties with Israeli universities.

In Denmark, students also set up a pro-Palestinian encampment at the University of Copenhagen. About 45 tents were erected on the lawn outside the Faculty of Social Sciences campus.


Students gather at an encampment with Palestinian flags at the University of Copenhagen’s City Campus in Copenhagen, Denmark, on May 6

Pro-Palestine protesters set up encampment at Naples University

Pro-Palestinian demonstrations and sit-ins continue to spread at universities around the world. An encampment has now been set up on a lawn located in the centre of Italy’s University of Naples Federico II, one of the world’s oldest academic institutions.

There have been regular pro-Palestine protests across Italy since Israel’s war on Gaza began seven months ago.


Police break up pro-Palestine protest at Berlin university

The German police have broken up a protest by hundreds of pro-Palestinian activists who had occupied a courtyard of Berlin’s Free University earlier today.

The protesters had put up about 20 tents and formed a human chain around the tents. Police called on the protesters via loudspeakers to leave the campus.

Most protesters had covered their faces with medical masks and had draped keffiyehs around their heads, shouting slogans like “viva, viva Palestina”, meaning “long live, Palestine”.

In recent days, students have protested or set up encampments in Finland, Denmark, Italy, Spain, France, and the UK.


Police detain a person during a pro-Palestinian demonstration by the group Student Coalition Berlin at Freie Universitat Berlin in Berlin, Germany, May 7


Berlin university protesters demanded ‘genocide be stopped’

Police officers are inspecting what’s left from the sit-in protest that took place here for several hours. Earlier, they moved in to break up what had been taking place here when several hundred people decided to congregate and protest.

The officers moved in, taking people away, detaining them in ones, twos and threes, and dragging people away. We now have to wait to find out whether charges will be presented, but clearly, the university authorities wanted these people away.

The demands of the people were pretty clear, basically saying that it’s time that Germany should take part in the protest movement around the world.

They demand that the genocide, they say, that it’s taking place in Gaza be stopped. They also say that students who take part in these protests should not be banned from doing so and should not lose their status as students – that is something that many students who’ve taken part in protests are afraid of.

The question is going to be now that this has been broken up, will they come back? Will they target other universities in this city in the coming days and weeks? That’s to be seen.


Pro-Palestinian demonstrators at the protest camp in Freie Universitat Berlin