US universities shield themselves for graduations as Gaza protests continue

If there is a particularly solemn moment in the calendar of US universities, it is May, the month of graduation ceremonies, those immortalized in the movies where a more or less famous guest gives a congratulatory speech and the students throw their caps. on the air, to the applause of their families. They are sacrosanct acts, for which students prepare almost as much or more than for their own exams and which during the pandemic had to be celebrated virtually. This year, in the shadow of pro-Palestinian protests on campus, some institutions have chosen to cancel or postpone those events. Others, the majority, to reinforce security to avoid riots.

So far, more than 2,000 students have been arrested on nearly 40 campuses in 25 states in the country since the New York Police carried out the first evictions at Columbia University.

The police dismantling of the main camps in solidarity with Gaza has not stopped student protests on campus. On the contrary, new faculties and centers join the mobilization every day, despite warnings from the rectorates and the threat of intervention by the security forces, while the movement also threatens to spread throughout Europe. Agents of the New York Police Department (NYPD) arrested 56 people this Friday morning during the eviction of two pro-Palestinian camps at New York University (NYU, 13) and at the New School (43), after that the university authorities requested their help to disperse “the illegal camps.” As these are private premises, the police cannot act motu proprio.

The evictions resulted in “minimal confrontations” between agents and students, according to university authorities. The New School also adopted remote classes this Friday. A day earlier, an attempted rally at Fordham University, also in Manhattan, was also put down by the police.

New School officials requested intervention after protesters invaded the lobby of the central building and a student residence, and set up a camp that prevented students from entering their dormitories. “We have been very tolerant of students’ right to freedom of expression, as long as they did not interfere with the educational mission,” Donna Shalala, interim rector, declared this Friday. The decision is due, she stressed, “to the conduct of the students, not to their speech.”

The difficult balance between guaranteeing the constitutional right to freedom of expression of all members of the university community and at the same time preserving the normal development of academic activities has strained coexistence in this center, recognized as an academic, but also ideological, vanguard, in social Sciences.

The authorities at the Los Angeles campus of the University of California (UCLA) have experienced similar tensions. Tolerant with the protest at first, they claim to have been forced to request police intervention when the peaceful protest threatened to be derailed by the violent emergence of a group of pro-Israel counterprotesters, who broke down barriers and attacked the concentrated pro-Palestinian students.

Its rival university, the University of Southern California, has announced the cancellation of its main graduation ceremony on May 10, after having waived that its student of the year, Asma Tabassum, of Muslim religion, give a speech at that event . Instead, the school has promised “new activities and celebrations” to commemorate the end of its senior students’ careers.

At Columbia, the university that has become a symbol of the protests, Rector Nemat Minouche Shafik has promised that the graduation ceremony will be held as planned, on the 15th. But after the evictions, the Police will continue on the campus for at least two days after the event, until the 17th.

In one of the states with the highest proportion of Arab population in the country, the University of Michigan, where students have established a camp on campus, will hold its ceremony to honor newly graduated students surrounded by special security measures the next day 10. “Graduation celebrations have been a place of free expression and peaceful protest for decades, and will likely continue to be so,” the institution indicated in a statement. As part of the measures, a specific place will be established for protests outside the ceremony site, inspection points will be established for the entrance to the event and the entry of flags or posters will be prohibited. A team of volunteers will monitor the development of the event, and the State Police will assist the campus itself.

The campuses are shielded for the imminent graduation ceremonies in a climate of volatile calm, while from the rectorates and police departments the hypothesis is formulated in an increasingly loud voice that many of the protesters are elements outside the university. “Foreign agitators” have been defined by the mayor of New York, Democrat Eric Adams. Among the nearly 300 arrested Tuesday night in the clearing of the Columbia and public CUNY campuses, nearly half had no ties to the university, New York Police Department sources said Thursday. Meanwhile, another incident in the eviction of the occupied Columbia building has been clarified: the accidental discharge of the weapon of a police officer who intervened in the evacuation. No one was injured, and the projectile ended up embedded in the wall of the first floor of the building.

Follow all the international information on Facebook and xor in our weekly newsletter.

_