At least six people were arrested in the nightly raids carried out by Israeli forces on communities across the occupied West Bank, the Wafa news agency reports.

• Three young Palestinians were hauled off by Israeli troops travelling in a 10-vehicle convoy who raided Yabad town, located east of Jenin city, before dawn and searched homes.
• Two Palestinians were detained in the Askar refugee camp east of Nablus where a large number of Palestinian homes were stormed and searched, Wafa reports.
• A Palestinian man was also arrested during a raid and home searches by Israeli soldiers in Halhul town, north of Hebron.
• Israeli soldiers stormed Azzun town, located east of Qalqilya city, and searched homes but made no arrests.
• Palestinian families were also subject to house searches in the town of Anata, located northeast of occupied East Jerusalem.
• Raids also took place in Silat ad-Dhahr town and the villages of Rummna, al-Tayba, Anin and Fandaqumiya, located to the west and south of Jenin.
  

Israeli army kills Palestinian woman after alleged stabbing attack: Reports

Students and activist staff at Australia’s University of Sydney (USyd) have set up a Gaza solidarity encampment in support of Palestinians and similar student-led protests in the United States.

According to the university’s student newspaper, Honi Soit, the camp was established on the university’s campus on Tuesday when tents were pitched “emblazoned with graffiti reading ‘Free Palestine’ and ‘from the river to the sea’”.

Students form several Australian universities were in attendance for the launch of the encampment, which was inaugurated with a student activist “speak out” on the subject of the war on Gaza and the demand for USyd management to drop any ties to the state of Israel.

According to the student newspaper: “Many chants that were used on US campuses in the past week were repeated at the encampment tonight like “disclose, divest, we will not stop, we will not rest” followed by “Albanese/Sydney Uni you will see, Palestine will be free”.

Making our message clear!

We won't let our university get away with being complicit with the weapons companies that arm the genocide in Gaza.#gazacampusyd #FreePalestine #FreeGaza #fromtherivertothesea pic.twitter.com/LHOqFsRg1B

— USyd Students for Palestine (@SFP_USyd) April 24, 2024

Are ‘rogue provocateurs’ trying to hijack US pro-Palestine protests?

The university, where students have held pro-Palestine protests in recent days, says it is committed to “free speech” and will allow protests at upcoming ceremonies, including commencement, adding they must take place in “designated areas” to “limit disruptions”.

While the university said in a statement posted on its website that its officials “will generally be patient with lawful disruptions”, they will step in to “de-escalate” and address any interruptions that “significantly impede” ceremonies.

Flags and banners, it added, will not be permitted at the commencement events.

In addition to pro-Palestine rallies being held at the university, several dozen of its students have set up a tent encampment on campus to call on the institution to divest from pro-Israel companies.

They join students at dozens of US colleges and universities who have taken action over the Gaza war, including dozens arrested at Columbia University, New York University and Yale University.

US universities are doling out more heavy-handed discipline to pro-Palestininan protesters on campus, citing “safety concerns”, as some Jewish students say criticism of Israel has veered into anti-Semitism. Heated debates and exchanges of insults between pro-Palestinian and pro-Israeli demonstrators have occurred, particularly on the streets around Columbia University in New York City.

“There are no universities left in Gaza so we chose to reclaim our university for the people of Palestine,” said Soph Askanase, a Jewish student at Columbia who was arrested and suspended for protesting. “Anti-Semitism, Islamophobia and racism – in particular racism against Arabs and Palestinians – are all cut from the same cloth.”

Other students blamed university administrators for failing to protect their right to protest and stand up for human rights. “As a Palestinian student, I too did not feel safe for the past six months, and that was as a direct result of Columbia’s one-sided statements and inaction,” Mahmoud Khalil said.

US President Joe Biden will be the commencement speaker for Georgia’s Morehouse College and at West Point next month. But his Morehouse appearance is drawing pushback from some faculty and alumni who oppose the president’s pro-Israel stance as it wages its war on Gaza.

Some Morehouse alumni want the school to rescind the invitation. They have been circulating an online letter that condemns the administration’s invitation to Biden and seeking signatures to pressure Morehouse President David Thomas to rescind it.

The letter, obtained by The Associated Press, claimed Biden’s approach to Israel effectively supports genocide in Gaza and runs counter to the pacifism that King expressed with his opposition to the Vietnam War.

“In inviting President Biden to campus, the college affirms a cruel standard that complicity in genocide merits no sanction from the institution that produced one of the towering advocates for nonviolence of the twentieth century,” the letter states, emphasising King’s stance that “war is a hell that diminishes” humanity as a whole.

“If the college cannot affirm this noble tradition of justice by rescinding its invitation to President Biden, then the college should reconsider its attachment to Dr. King.”

The administration has told faculty it will not withdraw its invitation, which was issued in September 2023, according to AP.

Columbia extends deadline to end Gaza war protest by 48 hours

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/4/24/columbia-pro-palestine-protesters-face-deadline-to-clear-out-whats-next

Many Columbia University faculty members ‘furious’ over arrest of student protesters

Following the release of a video by Hamas showing Israeli-American captive Hersh Goldberg-Polin, currently held in Gaza, hundreds of family members and supporters of the remaining Israeli captives took to the streets to demand their return.

At least two were arrested, according to Israeli media reports and videos verified by Al Jazeera, for reportedly setting barrels on fire and for moving rubbish bins onto the street. Israeli media said demonstrators headed to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s private residence in Jerusalem. Some banged on drums, others chanted: “It’s time to bring them home.”

Footage posted on X by Israel’s Channel 12 shows some scenes from the protests:

אחרי הסרטון של הרש מעזה: הפגנה ספונטנית למען החטופים מול בית רה"מ בירושלים pic.twitter.com/c3IrqnCneL

— החדשות - N12 (@N12News) April 24, 2024

Germany’s decision to resume UNRWA funds ‘disappointing’, says Israel

Erika Guevara Rosas, senior official at the NGO Amnesty International, has issued a statement on the discovery of mass graves holding hundreds of Palestinian bodies in the Gaza Strip.

More than 300 bodies have been uncovered so far from Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis after Israeli forces withdrew on April 7. The UN Human Rights Council on Tuesday said more bodies were found at Gaza City’s al-Shifa Hospital, the enclave’s largest health facility, which the rights body said was “an empty shell” after a two-week Israeli siege ended there on April 1.

“The harrowing discovery of these mass graves underscores the urgency of ensuring immediate access for human rights investigators, including forensic experts, to the occupied Gaza Strip to ensure that evidence is preserved”, the Amnesty official said.

“Lack of access for human rights investigators to Gaza has hampered effective investigations into the full scale of the human rights violations and crimes under international law committed over the past six months, allowing for the documentation of just a tiny fraction of these abuses,” she added.

The Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor has joined numerous rights groups and nations in calling for an independent investigation into the discovery of dozens of mass graves in Gaza. It said its team members on the ground had witnessed the exhumation of hundreds of bodies found in the vicinity of Gaza City’s al-Shifa Hospital and saw victims “handcuffed … who were executed”.

In a statement, Euro-Med said the high number of bodies that have been recovered is “alarming, and requires urgent international action, including the formation of an independent international investigation committee”.

Many of those who lost their lives were subjected to “premeditated murder as well as arbitrary and extrajudicial executions while they were detained and handcuffed”, it added.


UN spokesperson says ‘all parties’ must agree to mass graves investigation

The deputy spokesperson for the head of the UN, Farhan Haq,  says “all of the parties” who have the power to allow investigators access into Gaza must agree to any potential independent probe into the mass graves discovered in the vicinity of Gaza’s two largest hospitals.

More than 300 bodies have been recovered so far from mass graves at Khan Younis’s Nasser Hospital, and more than 380 bodies have been recovered from Gaza City’s al-Shifa Medical Complex, according to civil defence crews. International outcry and demands from an independent probe are quickly growing.

“For any investigations to be effective, all of the parties in the area that control access sufficient to conduct investigations would need to agree to it,” Haq told Al Jazeera, when questioned at a press briefing by our reporter Gabriel Elizondo. This means Israel, which has been widely accused of being responsible for the mass graves, must agree to cooperate with the investigation.

“There’s always difficulties in terms of places where conflict has occurred, to get the access we need, but ultimately for any investigation to be meaningful, you need that access,” Haq said. Haq reiterated that an “independent, effective and transparent investigation” into the killings at Nasser and al-Shifa hospitals must be conducted.

Several Palestinians were killed and others were injured, most of them seriously, as a result of Israeli army shelling of a house this evening in the Yabna refugee camp in the centre of Rafah, southern Gaza Strip. Footage obtained by Al Jazeera showed the arrival of the injured children and the elderly at the Kuwaiti hospital in Rafah.

Dr Suhaib al-Hams, the director of the Kuwaiti hospital, confirmed the arrival of the victims, telling Al Jazeera that the “Rafah governorate has become a continuous target of [the Israeli army].”

“The Israeli occupation uses internationally prohibited weapons, and the type of injuries we receive is unprecedented, such as amputation of limbs and laceration of the body,” al-Hams said. Dr Jamal al-Hams, one of the medical staff at the Hospital, said that most of the injuries that reached the hospital are serious, and that one of the injured died as a result of his severe injury.

Yemen’s Houthi group has said its fighters targeted the Maersk Yorktown ship and an American warship in the Gulf of Aden.

The group also targeted the Israeli ship MSC Veracruz in the Indian Ocean, its military spokesman Yahya Sarea said in a televised speech.

The Houthis have been attacking commercial and military shipping in the Red Sea since the early days of Israel’s war on Gaza, prompting airstrikes by the US and UK on targets belonging to the group inside Yemen. The group says the attacks will continue until a ceasefire is reached in Gaza.

Rebecca Karl, a professor of history at New York University (NYU), says previous protests at Columbia University in the past were “quite confrontational”, but were still “nothing like this”. New York City police arrested dozens of student protesters on NYU’s campus earlier this week, who were demonstrating in support of Palestinians.

Karl was a student at Columbia University, and says she has been a faculty member with NYU for many years.

Protests against Israel’s continuing assault on Gaza have taken place at several US universities, most notably at New York City’s Columbia University, where more than 100 students who gathered at the school’s campus have been arrested.

“There have been a number of protests, there have been a number of confrontations that have been dealt with by universities in ways that stress that we are not a violent institution,” she told Al Jazeera.

“But I’m personally very concerned,” she said.

Hundreds of pro-Palestinian protesters at the University of Texas have been in a tense standoff with mounted state troopers, the latest in a series of confrontations rocking campuses across the United States.

As students at the university staged a walkout chanting “down with occupation,” state troopers on horseback were making their way through campus – while elsewhere police in riot gear were pushing back protesters, AFP reported, referencing social media footage.

At least two people had been arrested, the student newspaper The Daily Texan reported.

The standoff in Austin comes as ongoing protests at New York’s Columbia University amid Israel’s war on Gaza have sparked intense attention from media and politicians – and similar demonstrations across the country.



How the UK reports it

Riot police arrest students as Palestine protests spread to colleges in Texas and California

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/palestine-protests-college-campuses-texas-california-b2534219.html

Riot police are arresting students at campuses across the US as protests over the Israel-Hamas war continue to grow.

On Wednesday afternoon, police on horseback arrived at University of Texas at Austin’s campus and began arresting students, according to The Texas Tribune. At least 20 people participating in the protest, organised by the university’s Palestinian Solidarity Committee, were detained.


_{Students and community members clash with USC Public Safety Officers during a Gaza solidarity occupation on campus to advocate for Palestine in Los Angeles, California, USA, 24 April 2024}

The students were demanding that the institution divest from manufacturers supplying Israel weapons in attacks against Palestine, a call that’s been echoed on campuses nationwide. The students gathered at a gym with plans to march through the university and hold a sit-in. By 12pm CT, 200 students had banded together.

Up to 100 state troopers were called in to stop the demonstrations. The UT Division of Student Affairs issued a statement saying that the protests are not supported by the university.

“UT Austin does not tolerate disruptions of campus activities or operations like we have seen at other campuses”, the statement read. “This is an important time in our semester with students finishing classes and studying for finals and we will act first and foremost to allow those critical functions to proceed without interruption”.

Republican Governor Greg Abbott called on the protestors to be arrested in a statement posted to X. “Arrests being made right now & will continue until the crowd disperses”, he wrote. “Students joining in hate-filled, antisemitic protests at any public college or university in Texas should be expelled”.

Similar scenes broke out at the University of Southern California as police there arrested a Palestinian student organiser who was later released. More than 100 students at the college placed tents, banners and signs in the centre of the campus.

A peaceful protest on Wednesday was disrupted by officers with USC’s Department of Public Safety. Officials have now called in the Los Angeles Police Department for backup as tensions escalate. About 300 people are now protesting on school grounds and police have closed the campus to anyone without a university-issued ID.

Other encampments have been established at Brown University, the University of Michigan, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and California State Polytechnic, Humboldt.



Additional arrests were seen at universities this week, including Ohio State and Columbia University. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson called for Columbia’s President Dr Nemat Shafik to resign before his scheduled visit to speak with the school’s Jewish students.

“It’s unconscionable”, Mr Johnson said on The Hugh Hewitt Show of the protests. “This president has shown to be very weak, inept leader. They cannot even guarantee the safety of Jewish students. They’re expected to run for their lives and stay home from class. It’s just maddening”. The speaker continued his comments by calling on authorities to revoke the visas of international student protestors.

Mr Johnson spoke to drowning chants of “We can’t hear you” as he delivered remarks from the steps of Columbia on Wednesday afternoon, calling for student protestors to be arrested. Jewish students told the speaker that they feel unsafe on campus, Mr Johnson said.


This has nothing to do with Jewish students. Many Jewish students are among the protestors.

It's a UK newspaper, look how they end the article:

The Israel-Hamas war began on 7 October 2024 after the group went into the country and killed at least 250 people and injured 1,500. Officials called it one of the deadliest attacks in the nation’s history.

Nothing about the ongoing destruction and genocide in Gaza. Plus they can't even get the numbers right "The final death toll from the attack is now thought to be 695 Israeli civilians, including 36 children, as well as 373 security forces and 71 foreigners, giving a total of 1,139."
https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20231215-israel-social-security-data-reveals-true-picture-of-oct-7-deaths

‘Not like other Passovers’: hundreds of Jewish demonstrators arrested after New York protest seder

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/24/not-like-other-passovers-hundreds-of-jewish-demonstrators-arrested-after-new-york-protest-seder

About 300 people were detained near Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer’s Brooklyn home.

Hundreds of Jewish anti-war demonstrators have been arrested during a Passover seder that doubled as a protest in New York, as they shut down a major thoroughfare to pray for a ceasefire and urge the Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, to end US military aid to Israel.

The 300 or so arrests took place on Tuesday night at Grand Army Plaza, on the doorstep of Schumer’s Brooklyn residence, where thousands of mostly Jewish New Yorkers gathered for the seder, a ritual that marked the second night of the holiday celebrated as a festival of freedom by Jews worldwide.

The protesters called on Schumer – who is among a minority of Democrats to recently criticize the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu – to stop arming Israel’s military, which relies heavily on US weapons, jet fuel and other military equipment.

“We as American Jews will not be used, we will not be complicit and we will not be silent. Judaism is a beautiful, thousands-year-old tradition, and Israel is a 76-year-old colonial apartheid state,” Morgan Bassichis, an organizer with Jewish Voice for Peace, told the crowd.

“This is the Passover that we take our exodus from Zionism. Not in our name. Let Gaza live.”

Mediating parties between Hamas and Israel had passed a video released earlier today by Hamas of American-Israeli captive Hersh Goldberg-Polin to the US and Israel on Monday, Axios reported.

It cited sources familiar with the matter as saying Qatar passed the video to Israeli and US officials two days before it was released by the group.

The cited another source as saying the Biden administration had asked the Qatari government several times for assistance in getting proof-of-life for Goldberg-Polin and other American hostages.

The issue, Axios reported, came up in phone calls between Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani, and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, as well as senior White House officials.

Israeli army spokesman says military ‘will pursue Hamas everywhere in Gaza’

Human rights lawyer Geoffrey Nice says it is important, in the case of any potential investigation into the mass graves in Gaza, to find evidence of how those killed were “before … or when they died”.

“Were their hands tied behind their backs, did they show signs of having been tortured in any visible way?” Nice told Al Jazeera.

When it comes to looking at the bodies, he said it is important for investigators to identify whether they were all “routinely” killed, or if they were all killed in “different ways”.

It is also important to find witnesses, Nice said.

“You can demand from Israel a written account, a record of how this came about, because you wouldn’t deploy a group of soldiers to fill a mass grave like this without there being some kind of record,” he added.

“So there is a whole lot of stuff to be done, and the sooner, the better.”

He said countries “completely uninvolved” and “unengaged” in the conflict would be suitable independent investigators.

We’ve been reporting on growing calls for an independent investigation as more mass graves are uncovered in Gaza. Al Jazeera’s Gabriel Elizondo asked US Deputy Ambassador to the UN Robert Wood if the US is planning to join the European Union in calling for an independent investigation.

Wood said the US has “obviously seen the reports” and photographs of the mass graves but that they want to “look into this a bit more and find out what exactly happened”.

Wood added the US would need to “find out all the facts we need to find out before we start making determinations”.

Growing calls for an independent investigation into the mass graves being uncovered in Gaza.

At the UN, Robert Wood, US Deputy Ambassador, stopped by the stakeout. Here is what I asked him and his answers:

Q: There is another mass grave found; 51 people. Several mass graves… pic.twitter.com/ZmgeN06EYu

— Gabriel Elizondo (@elizondogabriel) April 24, 2024

You will notice that from the White House’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, we never heard the word “independent”. That is the major difference between the US’s call for an investigation into the mass graves compared to that of other world leaders and of the UN High Commissioner [for human rights].

In fact, the US deputy ambassador to the UN told Al Jazeera earlier that the United States is not ready to endorse an independent investigation, but rather, the US would be talking to countries … and looking at photographs.

So there is still a lot of distance between what the US is calling for and what many other world leaders are calling for. And as far as accountability, certainly, we are very far from that step.

Palestinian journalist Mohammad Kuri-kea has been reporting on the war in Gaza. But now he’s covering a personal tragedy. His mother was killed by Israeli forces when they raided al-Shifa Hospital in March.

The armed wing of Hamas says it “lured two mechanised” units of the Israeli army and ambushed them in the al-Mughraqa area of the central Gaza Strip.

Death toll rises to 5 after Israel bombs Rafah home

Israeli shelling, raids in central and northern Gaza

_{Smoke rises above destroyed buildings in the north of the Gaza Strip on Wednesday}