NEW YORK:
The new school year is still days away, but student protesters have already roared back to the campus of New York’s Columbia University, the epicenter of a pro-Palestinian protest movement that spread to schools around the world this spring.
Blowing whistles and banging drums, pots and pans and the iron bars of the closed campus gates, about 50 protesters marched on the sidewalk Sunday night and chanted for the Palestinians. An NYPD surveillance drone hovered overhead.
Inside the gates, more than 1,000 new Columbia undergraduates had gathered for a convocation ceremony. Dr. Katrina Armstrong, Columbia’s new interim president, could be heard over the noise of the protesters, describing to young students her vision for the campus as a space of open discussion where no one feels excluded.
Columbia administrators are hoping to avoid a repeat of the protests that rocked the university earlier this year, which culminated in hundreds of armed police sweeping the campus in April to arrest more than 30 student protesters who had barricaded themselves inside an academic building.
Since spring, college administrators across the US and beyond have grappled with encampments in scenes inspired by the Columbia protests spreading to their own campuses, followed by pro-Israel counter-demonstrations. Some administrators also called the police. a minority have reached agreements on demands to sever economic ties with Israel.
“Effective management of protests and demonstrations allows us to advance our educational and research missions while allowing free speech and debate,” Armstrong, the dean of Columbia’s medical school, wrote in a campus-wide email last week.
She has been interim leader since Minouche Shafik resigned as chair earlier this month following criticism of her handling of the protests, including a no-confidence vote by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences angered by her decision to call in the police to arrest students .
The pro-Palestinian protests were led by Columbia University Apartheid Divest (CUAD), a coalition of student groups demanding that the school end its investments in arms manufacturers and other companies that support Israel’s military occupation of Palestinian territories.
Over the summer, mediators had little success trying to revive negotiations between the Columbia administration and CUAD, according to Mahmoud Khalil, a Palestinian graduate student who is one of the lead negotiators on behalf of CUAD.
“The university should actually treat students as students, not as a threat to Columbia and the Columbia brand,” he said. Columbia declined interview requests from administrators, and a spokesman declined to answer questions about talks with CUAD.
Changes on campus
As faculty and students return to Columbia before classes resume Tuesday, they are already noticing new restrictions and other changes on its campus.
South lawn fences yellowed by tent encampments are now green, with public safety officers guarding the entrances and new signs noting that camping is prohibited by school rules.
Campus gates that have remained open for decades to surrounding city streets are closed under a new system that limits access, with guards allowing entry only to those with Columbia IDs and pre-registered visitors.
Most days, CUAD students set up a small table with a Palestinian flag on the side of one of the campus’s main entrances, handing out leaflets and pamphlets, some designed with young students in mind.
Across campus, officials have set up fences and gates on wheels that can be rolled down hallways to block off small areas. A team of senior officers from the New York Police Department inspected the cordons during a tour of the campus last week.
Mariam Jallow, the incoming president-elect of Columbia’s student council, said she is optimistic about the new leadership.
“It’s a fresh start that we really need,” Jallow, a history major, said of Armstrong. “He doesn’t have many of the burdens that President Shafiq had, and there are still a lot of grievances and grudges from last year.”
Jallow, who is not a member of CUAD, said it was not easy to represent a diverse group of students, but noted that the main demands of CUAD, which was formed in 2016, have long had broad support among students at the main undergraduate school of Columbia. CUAD called for a 2020 Columbia College student referendum, and about 60% voted in favor of Columbia’s divestment from Israel. which rose to around 76% in an April referendum.
Over the summer, Columbia administrators continued disciplinary proceedings against more than 60 students, including Khalil, accused of violating campus rules by participating in CUAD protests.
Some students say the university is delaying investigations to discourage protests. A Columbia spokesman said the school is “working to expedite” the investigation.
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