Columbia University announced that classes would be held remotely on Monday after further days of unrest on the New York campus, following the arrest of pro-Palestinian protesters there last week.
With tensions rising further across many US university campuses, police officers also began arresting pro-Palestinian protesters at Yale University on Monday. Students there have been on hunger strike and protesters are calling for universities to back a ceasefire in Gaza and for their institutions to divest from companies with ties to Israel.
Amid the tumult, Joe Biden on Sunday criticized elements of the student actions, saying: “Even in recent days, we’ve seen harassment and calls for violence against Jews,” adding: “This blatant antisemitism is reprehensible and dangerous – and it has absolutely no place on college campuses, or anywhere in our country.”
Doug Emhoff, the husband of the vice-president, Kamala Harris, who is Jewish, weighed in on X, formerly Twitter, on Sunday evening, posting: “No student should live in fear on campus. The antisemitism and hate toward Jews, including threats of violence, that we are witnessing is unconscionable.”
On Monday, Columbia’s president, Nemat Minouche Shafik, said that school leaders would be convening to discuss the “crisis”, in addition to implementing virtual classes, NBC News reported.
In addition to condemning student protests, Shafik claimed that antisemitic language and intimidating and harassing behavior towards Jewish students had taken place on campus recently.
“The decibel of our disagreements has only increased in recent days. These tensions have been exploited and amplified by individuals who are not affiliated with Columbia who have come to campus to pursue their own agendas,” Shafik said. “We need a reset.”
A delegation of three US lawmakers are traveling to Columbia’s campus on Monday, Axios reported.
The Democratic representatives Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey, Dan Goldman of New York, and Jared Moskowitz of Florida will meet with Jewish students at Columbia and speak at the university.
Tensions are high at Columbia after more than 100 protesters were arrested on Thursday after Shafik instructed New York police to break up a student-led protest. Students had pitched tents to form a makeshift encampment as apart of a pro-Palestinian demonstration.
Scores of students were also suspended, including Isra Hirsi, the daughter of the Minnesota Democratic representative Ilhan Omar.
Shafik’s decision has been swiftly condemned by students, professors and politicians, who called the arrest and suspension of students unwarranted and a violation of free speech on campus.
The Columbia and Barnard chapters of the American Association of University Professors decried Shafik’s crackdowns on protests in a joint statement released on Friday.
“We are shocked at her failure to mount any defense of the free inquiry central to the educational mission of a university in a democratic society and at her willingness to appease legislators seeking to interfere in university affairs,” the chapters said, adding that Shafik invoked a “unilateral and wildly disproportionate punishment [for] peacefully protesting students”.
The progressive US representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan also called out punishments against Hirsi and other student protestors, the Hill reported.
“How does a student with no disciplinary record suddenly get to a suspension less than 24 hours after a nonviolent protest? What merits asymmetric crackdowns on Palestinian human rights protests,” Ocasio-Cortez said in a post to X.
Other US colleges and universities have announced extreme measures to punish students who participate in peaceful protests supporting Palestine.
The University of Michigan announced that it would draft new rules that will punish disruptive behavior after students held a protest during the university’s convocation ceremony on Sunday, the New York Times reported.
Graduations in the coming weeks are likely to be disrupted and colleges are rethinking how they will hold ceremonies and who can speak at them.
Joanna Walters contributed reporting