Columbia University Abdicates Its Duty to Academic Freedom with Ambush of Peaceful Student Protests for Gaza Wednesday, May 1, 2024 — New York, NY — Last night, Columbia University students were ambushed by hundreds of New York Police Department officers in a surprise attack on the student encampment calling for divestment from Israeli apartheid and genocidal warfare. Over a hundred students were arrested as police used ladders to climb into a university building, “pushed protesters to the ground and slammed them with metal barricades.” One student was thrown down a flight of stairs, according to video footage, as hundreds more called for the police to stand down. The NYPD Strategic Response Group marched on students with riot gear and broke into university buildings—at the request of the university President Minouche Shafik. The NYPD wreaked terror on Columbia’s student body last night. They violently dispersed protestors and have been invited by Shafik to occupy the campus through graduation to ensure no protest tents are set up on the campus’s public spaces again. “We have never seen more lawlessness in recent months than when Columbia University deployed droves of law enforcement on their own students who have for weeks exercised their First Amendment rights—and rights as students—to demand that investments in Israel’s war machine end immediately amid the genocide of over 34,000 Palestinians in Gaza,” said Dr. Osama Abu Irshaid, Executive Director of Americans for Justice in Palestine Action. AJP Action condemns Columbia University’s abdication of its responsibility to student rights and student safety. University leaders have a responsibility to uphold academic freedom, including students’ constitutionally-protected right to protest. We call on the Department of Education to investigate Columbia University’s collaboration with the NYPD to attack students despite documentation of students’ consistently peaceful protests. The attacks have disparate impacts on Palestinian, Muslim, and other students of color on campus and endangers all students for exercising their rights. This follows a trend across the country. At least one Muslim student at Arizona State University was handcuffed by police last night as well before officers ripped her hijab off; she was seated and did not resist arrest. Not only has Columbia University failed to protect its Palestinian, Arab, and Muslim students in particular, it has allowed all Palestine solidarity activists in its community to be subject to public doxxing and attacks by faculty, staff, members of foreign militaries, and elected officials alike. The university has testified against these students in Congress and mischaracterized their peaceful protests in order to repress views unpopular with major donors and pro-Israel Members of Congress. AJP Action expresses staunch support for the students and their demands—along with the demands and rights of students across the country: at UCLA, Yale, University of Minnesota, University of Texas, University of Wisconsin - Madison, and at dozens more campuses that have been attacked by law enforcement at the behest of university leadership. We also call on President Biden to condemn attacks on students and heed the popular movement to end support for Israel’s war in Gaza and to pursue diplomatic pathways to peace. As students seek legal action for the attacks yesterday, we stand by them and bear witness to the clear violations of their democratic rights and the widespread attacks on the integrity of higher education institutions in the U.S.
In solidarity, Americans for Justice in Palestine Action | 
