Dozens of students arrested in pro-Palestinian protest at Columbia University
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Pro-Palestinian protesters at Butler Library on the campus of Columbia University, New York, US, on May 7.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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NEW YORK – The police arrested dozens of Columbia University students who seized part of the school’s main library on May 7 in one of the biggest campus demonstrations since the 2024 student protest movement against Israel’s war in Gaza.
At least 40 to 50 students, their hands cuffed with plastic zip ties, were seen being loaded into New York Police Department (NYPD) vans and buses outside Butler Library as officers swept through the six-storey building to round up other protesters who refused to leave.
The police arrived on campus in force at the request of Columbia officials, who said the student demonstrators occupying the library’s second-floor main reading room were engaged in trespassing.
Videos and photographs on social media showed the protesters, most wearing masks, with banners saying “Strike For Gaza” and “Liberated Zone” beneath the Lawrence A. Wein Reading Room’s chandeliers in the Butler Library.
US President Donald Trump in 2024 lashed out at Columbia over pro-Palestinian protests on campus, saying they were anti-Semitic and showed a failure to protect Jewish students.
Student protesters, including some Jewish organisers, counter that Mr Trump and fellow conservative politicians who are strongly pro-Israel are unfairly conflating pro-Palestinian protests and anti-Semitism
Columbia’s board of trustees has been negotiating with the administration, which in March cancelled hundreds of millions of dollars of grants to the university for scientific research.
The university previously said it has worked to combat anti-Semitism and other prejudice on its campus, while fending off accusations from civil rights groups that it was giving in to government intrusions on academic freedom.
Columbia University said late on May 7 that it had requested NYPD assistance “in securing the building” and that two of its public safety officials were hurt in the stand-off.
Scuffle at front door
An NYPD spokesperson confirmed “multiple arrests” of protesters who occupied the library but did not provide an exact number.
On social media, New York Governor Kathy Hochul said: “Everyone has the right to peacefully protest. But violence, vandalism or destruction of property are completely unacceptable.”
Before police arrived on the scene, university public safety personnel were seen locking the front doors to the library, preventing any more students from entering the building and sparking a brief episode of pushing and shoving outside.
One student appeared to have been injured in the fracas. Another individual was seen being carried out of the building on a stretcher.
With further entry to the library barred, a growing crowd of demonstrators outside the building moved to the streets just beyond the campus gates.
One student organisation representing the protesters said on social media that school security had assaulted demonstrators and acknowledged that some activists had refused to show their identification to officials.
Columbia University Apartheid Divest, a collection of student groups, on May 7 recirculated on social media their longstanding demand that the university end investments of its US$14.8 billion (S$19.16 billion) endowment in weapons makers and other companies that support Israel’s military occupation of Palestinian territories.
On May 5, pro-Palestinian protesters occupied a University of Washington building, demanding the school cut ties with Boeing over its contracts with the Israeli military.
The university said 34 protesters were arrested and charges of trespassing, property destruction and disorderly conduct would be referred to prosecutors.
On May 7, it said the 21 students who were among those arrested have been suspended and banned from all of the school’s campuses.
Columbia was at the forefront of a pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel student protest movement that swept across US campuses in 2023 over Israel’s war in Gaza, which began in 2023.
Mr Trump, a Republican, is also trying to deport some pro-Palestinian international students at US schools, saying their presence could harm US foreign policy interests.
The protesters in the library also demanded the release of Mr Mahmoud Khalil
