Colombia: New York police stormed a university building that was occupied by students protesting the war in Gaza
image Source, reuters
- Author, contract
- Role, bbc news world
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New York police entered Hamilton Hall Tuesday night, a Columbia University building that was occupied a day earlier by students protesting against the war in Gaza.
Television images showed several agents climbing into a military-looking vehicle and approaching the building through a window, while hundreds of soldiers surrounded the area around the educational center, where there were also many protesters.
As police entered the building, protesters and their supporters outside the complex chanted “Shame” and “Colombia should be ashamed”,
BBC journalist Nomia Iqbal reported from the scene that several police buses loaded with detained protesters had left the complex.
It is the second time police have intervened in Colombia in less than two weeks to suppress protests against the Israeli military offensive in Gaza.
The protests escalated in the early hours of Tuesday when pro-Palestinian protesters barricaded themselves in Hamilton Hall, which they named after Hind Rajab, a 6-year-old girl found dead in Gaza earlier this year.
Various American universities have been the stage of protests against Israeli actions over the past two weeks and protesters consider it complicity on the part of the United States and its universities.
image Source, reuters
This came after some students were suspended by the university for violating the Monday deadline given by the authorities to leave the camp set up on the campus.
Following the occupation of the building, Columbia urged students and staff to stay away from campus and warned of possible eviction.
Local media reported on Wednesday that university officials He authorized the NYPD to enter the premises.
image Source, reuters
“Absolutely wrong”
The university released a statement this Tuesday in which it confirmed that police had arrived on campus at 9 p.m. at the request of university authorities to “restore order and security.”
“When the University learned that Hamilton Hall had been occupied, invaded and blockaded, we were left with no choice,” the text lamented. “Students have chosen to escalate the situation.”
The President of the United States Joe Biden said this Tuesday that Hamilton Hall has been seized “Completely wrong approach” By students.
White House spokesman Andrew Bates said the Democratic president has opposed “hateful, anti-Semitic slurs and violent rhetoric” throughout his life.
Bates said Biden “respects the right to free speech.” Protests must be “peaceful and legal”.
“Taking over a building by force is not peaceful, it’s wrong,” Bates said.
“And hate speech and symbols of hate have no place in America,” he added.
Former Republican President Donald Trump called the occupation “anti-Biden.”
He said, “All this has happened because he doesn’t know how to talk. He can’t put two sentences together. He has to come out and make a statement because universities are under attack in this country.”
The Columbia University campus in New York has been one of the epicenters of a wave of protests over Gaza that have rocked university life in different parts of the country and become a point of national debate.
While Republicans, led by Trump, condemn the protesters, whom they accuse of being outright anti-Semites, President Biden has rejected the students’ blatant actions while his government has been in power for weeks. Asking Israel to do more to guarantee human rights. Rights and distribution of humanitarian aid in the region.
image Source, getty images
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