Archiv: 17-04-2024: US students begin encampments against the Palestine War / nationwide movement / Biden on 01-05-2024: „order must prevail“ / raids and mass arrest / international movement


29.10.2024 - 13:30 [ VoteAgainstGenocide.com ]

Vote Against Genocide: American Academic Letter

As American scholars and higher education administrators, we are deeply committed to the pursuit of truth, justice, and the common good—both in our classrooms and research, and in the broader world we engage with daily. Since October 2023, the Biden-Harris administration has failed to uphold fundamental human rights and the principles of knowledge, truth, and humanity. Their material support for genocidal atrocities has devastated entire communities in Palestine, leading to the loss of countless families in Gaza over the past year, and undermined the core values the United States professes to uphold globally. Under Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic Party’s nominee for President, every university has been bombed and destroyed in Gaza, more journalists have been killed than in any other conflict in recorded modern history, and the death toll is projected to exceed 186,000 according to The Lancet. Under Biden-Harris, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) has prosecuted violations of the 1948 Genocide Convention, and declared Israel‘s occupation of Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, unlawful, along with its associated settlement apartheid regime.

This election, on November 5th, the Democratic Party—once again with Kamala Harris at its center—has repeatedly sought our votes by positioning itself as the „lesser evil,“ urging us to abandon our moral convictions out of fear of a second Trump term under Republican leadership. Let us be clear: there is no „lesser evil“ when both parties are complicit in the same atrocities. And there is no lesser evil when they are complicit in genocide. Kamala Harris has actively funded and endorsed genocide, and we cannot reward such leadership with a Harris-Walz ticket. While the Republican Party under a Trump-Vance ticket offers no meaningful alternative, it is the Democratic Party, under Kamala Harris, that has actively supported and sanctioned these international crimes against humanity since October 2023. They must not be rewarded.

29.10.2024 - 13:20 [ AbandonHarris.com ]

Abandon Harris Campaign’s Academic Letter Urges Nationwide Vote Against Genocide

The Abandon Harris Campaign announces that an academic letter calling on Americans to vote third party in the upcoming election is quickly gaining traction across higher education institutions nationwide. Titled “A Call by American Academics to Vote Against Genocide on November 5, 2024: Vote to Abandon Harris – Vote Third Party,” the principled letter condemns the Biden-Harris administration’s support for Israel’s actions in Gaza and urges voters to hold Kamala Harris accountable at the ballot box. The letter and its signatories can be found at voteagainstgenocide.org.

09.05.2024 - 11:10 [ NLTimes.nl ]

32 Gaza-support protesters arrested in Amsterdam; No clash with police in Utrecht

(09.05.2024)

There were again pro-Palestinian protests at universities in Amsterdam and Utrecht overnight.

09.05.2024 - 10:45 [ NLTimes.nl ]

Video: Amsterdam riot police strike Gaza protestors as university occupation broken up

(08.95.2024)

Police in Amsterdam began breaking up the occupation of University of Amsterdam buildings in the city center on Wednesday. The Binnengasthuis and other university buildings were squatted a day earlier by hundreds of pro-Palestinian demonstrators who had marched there from the university’s Roeterseiland campus on Tuesday afternoon.

09.05.2024 - 10:09 [ Associated Press / Youtube ]

Police make arrests, break up pro-Palestinian demonstration camp at University of Amsterdam

(07.05.2024)

Some 125 activists were arrested as police broke up a pro-Palestinian demonstration camp at the University of Amsterdam in the early hours of Tuesday, as protests that have roiled campuses in the United States spread into Europe.

09.05.2024 - 09:52 [ Guardian News / Youtube ]

Pro-Palestinian protests spread across European universities

(07.05.2024)

Demonstrations have taken place in Berlin, Vienna, Amsterdam and Belgium, where students have set up encampments and called for a ceasefire in Gaza. Violent clashes erupted in Amsterdam and authorities said at least 125 people were detained. In Berlin, students formed a human chain to protect their camp while police detained several people. The protests are in response to Israel‘s bombardment of Gaza.

09.05.2024 - 00:00 [ Common Dreams ]

Anti-Genocide Students Are Fulfilling Their Duty to Prevent War Crimes; Will You?

In a world order in which the Great Powers and many lesser ones are turning to war and genocide, popular enforcement of international law is one of the few means for protecting ourselves and the world against a cataclysmic plunge into unlimited military destruction.

By virtue of the U.S. Constitution, international law and international treaties are explicitly a part of U.S. law. U.S. Supreme Court Justice and Nuremberg prosecutor Robert Jackson stated, “The very essence of the Nuremberg Charter is that individuals have international duties which transcend national obligations of obedience imposed by the individual state.” So, obligations under international law are also obligations under U.S. law.

08.05.2024 - 23:12 [ Massachusetts Daily Collegian ]

Protesters arrested in waves following second encampment

According to a statement from University Spokesperson Edward Blaguszewski, 109 people have been booked as a result of the encampment, and around 25 people are waiting to be processed.

Blaguszewski’s statement read: “As chairman of the UMass Board of Trustees, I want to offer the Board’s full and unwavering support for Chancellor Javier Reyes,” said Chairman Stephen Karam. “We have absolute confidence in his leadership, his integrity, and his commitment to our students.”

08.05.2024 - 23:00 [ CBS News ]

Police arrest 130 at UMass Amherst; College says protesters refused to take down encampment

Police arrested about 130 people at the University of Massachusetts Amherst Tuesday night after the college says pro-Palestinian protesters refused to take down an encampment on campus and leave the area.

UMass has not said what the protesters are charged with, but 109 have been booked by campus police as of Wednesday morning and there are charges pending for about 25 more.

08.05.2024 - 21:26 [ Tagesschau.de ]

Polizei räumt Protestcamp an FU Berlin

(07.05.2024)

Berlins Regierender Bürgermeister Kai Wegner (CDU) hat die FU-Besetzung durch pro-palästinensische Aktivisten verurteilt. „Wir dürfen auch an den Hochschulen nicht wegschauen, wenn antisemitische Parolen und Judenhass an den Universitäten verbreitet werden“, sagte der CDU-Politiker am Dienstag. Er sei der Universität für ihr Vorgehen sehr dankbar: „Ich finde dieses konsequente Vorgehen völlig richtig.“

Auch Wissenschaftssenatorin Ina Czyborra (SPD) verurteilte die Besetzung des FU-Hofes scharf.

08.05.2024 - 21:15 [ GraphicNews.com ]

Pro-Palestinian protests sweep Europe

German police broke up a protest by between sixty and eighty pro-Palestinian activists who had occupied a courtyard on Freie Universität Berlin’s campus on Tuesday, May 7.

An occupation is not acceptable on the FU Berlin campus,” university president Guenter Ziegler said.

05.05.2024 - 07:31 [ Fox News ]

More than 2,100 arrested at anti-Israel protests nationwide as police clear college encampments

– The initial arrests sparked a movement on college campuses across the country, including at the University of Texas at Austin, the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, and the University of California, Los Angeles.

– More than 2,100 protesters have been arrested at colleges and universities in recent weeks, including students, faculty, and outside agitators.

05.05.2024 - 06:37 [ Middle East Eye ]

Debunking three myths about pro-Palestine student protests in the US

Middle East Eye examines three of the most pervasive myths that have sought to discredit the pro-Palestine movement on campuses

05.05.2024 - 05:59 [ New York Times ]

From Free Speech to Free Palestine: Six Decades of Student Protest

“You’ve got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you’ve got to make it stop,” he said. Soon the students would flood into a campus administration building.

That scene played out 60 years ago at the University of California, Berkeley. The words were directed at the university leadership, and referring to its restrictions on campus political activity. But the speech, from the student leader Mario Savio, and the sit-in that followed could have happened yesterday.

05.05.2024 - 05:20 [ New York Magazine ]

Our Campus. Our Crisis. Inside the encampments and crackdowns that shook American politics. A report by the staff of the Columbia Daily Spectator.

Written and reported by Isabella Ramírez, Amira McKee, Rebecca Massel, Emily Forgash, Noah Bernstein, Sabrina Ticer-Wurr, Apurva Chakravarthy, Esha Karam, Shea Vance, Sarah Huddleston, and Maya Stahl

04.05.2024 - 11:05 [ CNN ]

Australian student protests show US campus divisions over Gaza war are going global

n the past 10 days, pro-Palestinian protest camps have appeared at seven universities around Australia – from Melbourne and Sydney in the country’s southeast, to Adelaide in its center, and Perth along the western coast.

They were erected in solidarity with Palestinians under Israeli siege in Gaza and student protesters in the United States.

And it’s not just Australia.

04.05.2024 - 10:54 [ Reuters ]

‚Show solidarity‘: Pro-Palestinian protesters camp across Australian universities

(03.05.2024)

Pro-Palestinian activists set up an encampment last week outside the sandstone main hall at University of Sydney, one of Australia‘s largest tertiary institutions.
Similar camps have sprung up at universities in Melbourne, Canberra and other Australian cities.

04.05.2024 - 10:52 [ USA Today ]

How pro-Palestinian camp, and an extremist attack, roiled the protest at UCLA

Questions continue to swirl about whether extremist groups are involved in the protests, which first drew national attention at Columbia University in New York, and whether the protests themselves include hate speech. But the UCLA protest was one that was conclusively influenced by a clash with extremist forces this week.

A day later, police wearing riot gear tore the camp down and arrested more than 200 people in the early hours of Thursday morning. USA TODAY reported from the scene. Here is what happened.

04.05.2024 - 10:24 [ France24.com ]

Police remove pro-Palestinian student protesters from Paris‘s Sciences Po university

Prime Minister Gabriel Attal‘s office said such protests would be dealt with using „total rigour“, adding that 23 university sites had been „evacuated“ on Thursday.

04.05.2024 - 09:50 [ New York Times ]

How Counterprotesters at U.C.L.A. Provoked Violence, Unchecked for Hours

A New York Times examination of more than 100 videos from clashes at the University of California, Los Angeles, found that violence ebbed and flowed for nearly five hours, mostly with little or no police intervention. The violence had been instigated by dozens of people who are seen in videos counterprotesting the encampment.

The videos showed counterprotesters attacking students in the pro-Palestinian encampment for several hours, including beating them with sticks, using chemical sprays and launching fireworks as weapons. As of Friday, no arrests had been made in connection with the attack.

04.05.2024 - 09:45 [ Tagesschau.de ]

300 Teilnehmer: Festnahmen bei Pro-Palästina-Demo an Humboldt-Uni

Wie ein Polizeisprecher dem rbb sagte, hatten sich etwa 300 Personen zunächst zu einer unangemeldeten Kundgebung im Ehrenhof der HU zusammengefunden. Weil es wiederholt volksverhetzende Parolen gegeben habe, seien demnach knapp 40 Freiheitsbeschränkungen eingeleitet worden, um Personalien aufzunehmen. Dabei habe es auch Widerstand und tätliche Angriffe auf Polizeibeamte gegeben.

04.05.2024 - 09:15 [ Allie Wong / USA Today ]

I‘m a student who was arrested at a Columbia protest. I am not a hero, nor am I a villain.

Students in dorms craned their necks and shakily stretched their iPhones out windows to observe the impending attack.

We clung tighter to one another as they approached us, and seized us like rag dolls and slammed us into the hallowed ground of brick and concrete. But unlike rag dolls, we bleed, we crack, we bruise, we feel.

04.05.2024 - 08:47 [ USA Today ]

Encampment raid at NYU, hunger strike at Princeton as campus battles rage across US: Live updates

Arrests piled up at several colleges, 14 Princeton University students launched a hunger strike, and police raided an NYU encampment Friday in the latest battles on college campuses that have pitted university officials against their own students over the war in Gaza.

04.05.2024 - 08:33 [ Jezebel.com ]

Biden and Harris Tweet Through It as Police Raid Anti-War Student Protests

Columbia called the NYPD on its own students Tuesday night for protesting Israel‘s war on Gaza. Similar raids have taken place at UCLA, USC, and NYU. The president and vice president responded with cringe tweets about women‘s rights and mental health.

03.05.2024 - 06:00 [ Common Dreams ]

Biden Condemned for Ahistorical and ‚Politically Suicidal‘ Attack on Campus Protests

„Biden‘s claim that ‚dissent must never lead to disorder‘ defies American history, from the Boston Tea Party to the tactics that civil rights activists, Vietnam War protesters, and anti-apartheid activists used to confront injustice.“

03.05.2024 - 05:20 [ Axios ]

Hundreds of protesters arrested at college campuses across the U.S.

Police said in a statement early Thursday that 90 people were arrested at Dartmouth College „for multiple offenses including criminal trespass and resisting arrest.“ Those arrested included both Dartmouth students and non-Dartmouth students, per the statement.

What else is happening: The NYPD said officers made several arrests at Fordham University on Wednesday evening, one day after they arrested 282 pro-Palestinian protesters at Columbia University and the City College of New York.

The University of Wisconsin at Madison said………..

03.05.2024 - 05:00 [ Democracy Now ]

“People Could Have Died”: Police Raid UCLA Gaza Protest, Waited as Pro-Israel Mob Attacked Encampment

We get an update from the University of California, Los Angeles, where police in riot gear began dismantling a pro-Palestinian encampment early Thursday, using flashbang grenades, rubber bullets and tear gas, and arresting dozens of students. The raid came just over a day after pro-Israel counterprotesters armed with sticks, metal rods and fireworks attacked students at the encampment. The Real News Network reporter Mel Buer was on the scene during the attack. She describes seeing counterprotesters provoke students, yelling slurs and bludgeoning them with parts of the encampment’s barricade, and says the attack lasted several hours without police or security intervention. ”UCLA is complicit in violence inflicted upon protesters,” wrote the editorial board of UCLA’s campus newspaper, the Daily Bruin, the next day. Four of the paper’s student journalists were targeted and assaulted by counterprotesters while covering the protests.

03.05.2024 - 04:43 [ Daily Bruin ]

Chancellor Block claims unsafe university conditions led to encampment closure

Chancellor Gene Block released a statement Thursday afternoon claiming that the Palestine solidarity encampment had been shut down because it led to unsafe university conditions and interfered with UCLA’s educational mission.

Block confirmed that more than 200 people were arrested, with more than 300 leaving voluntarily Thursday morning following a police sweep of the encampment. The dispersal followed an outbreak of violence on Tuesday night and early Wednesday morning, during which counter-protesters attacked the encampment using fireworks, tear gas and by throwing projectiles.

03.05.2024 - 04:17 [ theCorsaironline.com ]

UCLA Pro-Palestinian Encampment Raided after Dispersal Order

Throughout the night and into the morning, students outside the encampment linked arms against the police and a small group of counter protesters, remaining peaceful. Around 1:20 a.m. police dressed in riot gear broke through the west barricade unexpectedly after a loud boom sounded from a flash-bang grenade. The protestors quickly formed a human chain, slowly pushing forward, and shouting “peaceful protest,” as well as phrases such as “shame on you.”

The students pushed the officers back, regaining control of the perimeter in approximately 30 minutes and rebuilding their barricades.

Police then began shooting fireworks into the air above protestors’ heads…

03.05.2024 - 04:00 [ 6ABC.com ]

Biden says ‚order must prevail‘ during campus protests over the war in Gaza

President Joe Biden on Thursday defended the right to protest but insisted that „order must prevail“ as college campuses across the country face unrest over the war in Gaza.

„Dissent is essential for democracy,“ he said at the White House. „But dissent must never lead to disorder.“

03.05.2024 - 03:52 [ APNews.com ]

Police officer fired gun while clearing protesters from Columbia building, prosecutors say

He did not provide additional details on the incident, which was first reported by news outlet The City.

The New York Police Department did not immediately respond to The Associated Press’ request for comment.

02.05.2024 - 00:20 [ Jewish Voice for Peace at UCLA (@jvpatucla) / Instagram ]

If you can’t join the encampment but are looking for other ways to support, consider these options!

01.05.2024 - 22:54 [ Mastodon.social ]

#ucla

(search results)

01.05.2024 - 19:11 [ Middle East Eye ]

America‘s new generation of student protesters is giving hope to Palestinians

We raise our hats out of respect for them, as these protests in the universities and streets of the western world and the Global South keep the flame of hope burning in the souls of our people who long for freedom and justice.

These protests indicate profound, radical changes that separate an ageing American generation that blindly supports Israel and a new generation that promotes justice in Palestine and demands an end to the Israeli occupation and to the war on Gaza.

They represent the future of America and its bright face, the emergence of which we have long awaited.

01.05.2024 - 17:05 [ SJP AT UCLA (@sjpatucla) / instagram ]

UCLA Palestine Solidarity Encampment Press Release

For over seven hours, zionist aggressors hurled gas canisters, sprayed pepper spray, and threw fireworks and bricks into our encampment. They broke our barriers repeatedly, clearly in an attempt to kill our community.

Campus safety left within minutes, external security the university hired for “backup” watched, filmed, and laughed on the side as the immediate danger inflicted upon us escalated. Law enforcement simply stood at the edge of the lawn and refused to budge as we screamed for their help. The only means of protection we had was each other. WE KEEP EACH OTHER SAFE.

01.05.2024 - 16:25 [ Indybay.org ]

UCLA Palestine Solidarity Encampment Press Release

For over seven hours, zionist aggressors hurled gas canisters, sprayed pepper spray, and threw fireworks and bricks into our encampment. They broke our barriers repeatedly, clearly in an attempt to kill our community.

Campus safety left within minutes, external security the university hired for “backup” watched, filmed, and laughed on the side as the immediate danger inflicted upon us escalated. Law enforcement simply stood at the edge of the lawn and refused to budge as we screamed for their help. The only means of protection we had was each other. WE KEEP EACH OTHER SAFE.

Despite the danger, we refused to engage standing by the principles of our encampment—self defense. For all the school’s pretense of student safety, we have experienced an unprecedented amount of violence and hatred while they stood by. The university’s hypocrisy all too apparent, as signs of this escalation were reported, documented, and indicated early on. The zionist attacks, their use of chemical weaponry, their hatred, their destruction, are but a microcosm of the genocide in Gaza. The university would rather see us dead than divest.

01.05.2024 - 16:09 [ FOX 11 Los Angeles / Youtube ]

Fight breaks out at UCLA; Fireworks thrown at pro-Palestine tents

Multiple fights broke out in dueling protests between Israel and Palestine protesters.

01.05.2024 - 16:00 [ Daily Bruin ]

Pro-Israel counter-protesters attempt to storm encampment, sparking violence

Fireworks, tear gas and fights broke out just after 10:50 p.m. Tuesday night and continued early Wednesday morning as around 100 pro-Israel counter-protesters attempted to seize the barricade around and storm the ongoing Palestine solidarity encampment in Dickson Plaza.

The chaos comes as Chancellor Gene Block faces criticism for improper handling of the encampment and the same day the university deemed the encampment to be unlawful, threatening students inside with suspension and expulsion. Security and UCPD both retreated as pro-Israel counter-protesters and other groups attacked protesters in the encampment – led by Students for Justice in Palestine and UC Divest Coalition at UCLA – that followed similar ones across the country.