Pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel protest encampments are springing up at several US universities following unrest around mass student demonstrations at Columbia University in recent weeks amid the ongoing war in Gaza.
Tent encampments could be seen on campuses including New York University, MIT, Tufts University and Emerson College, according to social media posts and local news reports.
An encampment at Emerson College is reportedly positioned next to the campus Hillel branch, where many Jewish students are expected to visit for the Passover holiday tonight.
Anti-Israel signs including “From the river to the sea” were displayed on tents erected along a downtown Boston alley near the university.
At MIT, students take part in Muslim prayers next to a tent encampment, protesting what they say it the university’s failure to call for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.
They are also calling on MIT to cut ties with Israel’s military, amid the war ongoing in Gaza since Hamas’s October 7 massacre.
On the other side of the country, social media posts show tent encampments at the University of California, Berkley and the University of Southern California in Los Angeles.
Universities have become the focus of intense cultural debate in the US since war erupted after Hamas’s October 7 massacre, which saw some 3,000 terrorists burst into Israel by land, air and sea, killing some 1,200 people and seizing 253 hostages, mostly civilians, many amid acts of brutality and sexual assault.
Protests ramped up at Columbia University last week, when pro-Palestinian demonstrators set up tents in a call for the university to divest from companies that have ties to Israel.
After several incidents of antisemitic language and a series of arrests at Columbia, US President Joe Biden yesterday condemned antisemitism on college campuses, while New York Mayor Eric Adams said he was “horrified and disgusted” by the reports, vowing that police would arrest anyone breaking the law.
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