Pro-Palestinian protesters have taken over a university building in the United States – the latest escalation of demonstrations on university campuses against the war between Israel and Hamas.
Protesters barricaded the entrance to the Columbia University building in new York Tuesday and displayed a Palestinian flag through a window.
Video footage showed protesters on the Manhattan campus locking arms in front of Hamilton Hall and carrying furniture and metal barricades into the building.
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Photo: AP
A group called Columbia University Apartheid Divest (CUAD) said Hamilton Hall was now called “Hind’s Hall” in honor of Hindu Rajaba six-year-old girl killed in a strike on Gaza in February.
The student radio station aired a detailed report of the hall takeover, which occurred nearly 12 hours after the deadline set by protesters to vacate an encampment of about 120 tents or face suspension.
Protesters unfurled a flag with the words “Hind’s Hall”. Photo: Reuters
Protesters at Hamilton Hall. Photo: Reuters
Protesters said they planned to stay in the hall until the university accedes to CUAD’s three demands: divestment, financial transparency and amnesty.
One protester, a 22-year-old student who wished to remain anonymous, told Sky News that she had relatives in Gaza and that she “would not stop participating in protests until the end of the war and that (Columbia University) agrees to divest.”
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“We have Jewish, Christian and Muslim believers, as well as people without faith, beside me, holding my hand in solidarity with the injustice happening in Palestine,” she said.
“If we have to stay here all day, we will. We need peace and justice. They threaten to suspend us, but we defend human rights.”
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Dozens of people were arrested Monday during protests at universities in Texas, Utah, Virginia and New Jersey, while Columbia said hours before the Hamilton Hall takeover that it had begun to suspend students.
Police decided to clear an encampment at Yale University in Connecticut on Tuesday morning, but no arrests were immediately reported.
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The campus protests began as a response by some students to the Israeli offensive in Gaza after Hamas launched a deadly attack on southern Israel on October 7.
