Wednesday’s riots were the latest in a series of increasingly violent protests spreading through Europe demanding that universities sever ties with Israel over its war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
Dutch Police surrounded the remaining protesters, still occupying an area of UvA. Most activists were forced to leave a university building where furniture and central heating radiators were daubed with paint and walls defaced with texts such as “Free Palestine” and “Ceasefire now.”
Reporters noticed mattresses on the floor, large shopping bags with food and drinks, and piles of sanitary towels and other care products, which was a sign that the protests had been well prepared.
Wednesday’s confrontation came after days of unrest around several Duch universities where more than 200 people were detained, according to Worthy News estimates based on police reports.
Overnight at Utrecht University, some 45 kilometers (28 miles) outside the Dutch capital, police detained dozens of protesters.
Besides the Netherlands, anti-Israel protests have also been held at universities in several other European nations, such as af Sorbonne University in Paris, France, where 86 people were arrested on Tuesday night for offenses that included wilful damage, intrusion in an education establishment, and disrupting order, French prosecutors said.
The arrests came after about 100 student protesters occupied a lecture hall at the university for two hours.
In Paris, police on Tuesday twice intervened at Paris’s prestigious Sciences Po University to disperse about 20 students who had barricaded themselves in the main hall.
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