Harvard Students Intensify Protests Over Israel-Hamas Conflict
Students at Harvard University have intensified their on-campus protests in solidarity with the Palestinians amid the ongoing conflict with Israel. These demonstrations echo similar actions taking place at Columbia, Yale, and NYU.
On Wednesday, hundreds of Harvard students gathered in Harvard Yard to protest the suspension of the Palestine Solidarity Committee. They marched from their dormitories, chanting slogans and erecting tents. The protests are part of a broader movement across several universities, with students demanding that their schools sever financial ties with companies linked to Israel, end US military aid to Israel, and stop pursuing disciplinary action against student activists.
University officials are attempting to navigate the delicate balance between upholding free speech rights and maintaining order on campus. Some universities have resorted to arrests and the dismantling of protest encampments. At the University of Texas at Austin, dozens of state troopers in riot gear dispersed a student walkout protest on Wednesday, arresting several individuals, according to the Dallas Morning News. Princeton University has warned students that anyone involved in an encampment or occupation who refuses to disperse will face arrest and an immediate campus ban.
Columbia University has become a particular flashpoint in these campus disruptions, given the intense polarization surrounding the Israel-Hamas conflict. The demonstrations follow President Minouche Shafik’s congressional testimony last week, in which she defended the university’s actions to protect Jewish students. US Representative Elise Stefanik, a New York Republican, criticized Shafik’s leadership and called for her resignation. Faculty and students were outraged after Shafik authorized police intervention, resulting in over 100 arrests.
Lawmakers from both parties are paying close attention to the campus strife. Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson visited Columbia on Wednesday to meet with Jewish students and address the “troubling rise of virulent antisemitism on America’s college campuses.” Johnson stated that if threats continue, President Joe Biden may need to deploy the National Guard. In a statement on April 23, Shafik expressed her support for free speech and acknowledged the peaceful nature of many student protests. However, she warned that she would consider “alternative options” for clearing the encampment if negotiations proved unsuccessful.
With the end of the semester approaching and protests continuing, Columbia has given faculty the option to move classes to a hybrid format, allowing students to complete their courses remotely and avoid areas of campus where tensions are high. Other schools have also faced similar disruptions. At Yale, police arrested 60 individuals, including 47 students, on Monday. President Peter Salovey cited “police reports identifying harmful acts and threatening language used against individuals at or near the protest sites.” In New York City, around 350 students and supporters gathered in Washington Square Park to protest Israel’s conduct in the conflict and the university’s handling of the protests. Police arrested more than 100 people who had camped out in a plaza near the university’s business school.
A few blocks north, approximately 50 people protested at the New School’s Greenwich Village campus, calling on the institution to divest its holdings tied to Israel. The protests, coinciding with the Jewish holiday of Passover, have drawn condemnation from the White House and university donors. They have also raised concerns about the heavy-handed tactics employed by some universities against student protesters and the threats made against Jewish students.
At some protests, the debate has escalated into harassment and threats, with demonstrators at Columbia reportedly chanting “go back to Poland!” at Jewish students. At the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the Israel Alliance student group cited “significant fear among the Jewish community” in light of events on other campuses and relocated its traditional Passover Seder.
Broadly, campus protesters aim to highlight humanitarian concerns in Gaza following the outbreak of hostilities between Hamas and Israel in October 2021. Hamas’s offensive, which included rocket attacks on Israeli cities, resulted in the deaths of over 1,200 people, while the Israeli response has led to the deaths of approximately 34,000 Palestinians, mostly civilians, according to the Hamas-run health ministry. The US government has designated Hamas as a terrorist organization.
