Fresh chaos, arrests on US college campuses as Biden calls for ‘order’ • FRANCE 24 English

in recent weeks uh the United States has seen police arrest nearly 2,200 people during prop Palestinian protest at college campuses across the country at times the encounters have turned violent police Sometimes using riot gear pepper spray flashbang devices and even armored vehicles to try and clear out student encampments on public and private universities most demonstrators are calling for their schools to divest from Israel University officials have varied in their response from taking successful efforts to deescalate tensions to calling in police to storm buildings on Thursday President Joe Biden insisted that order must Prevail take a listen it’s against the law when violence occurs destroying property is not a peaceful protest it’s against the law vandalism trespassing breaking Windows shutting down campuses forcing the cancellation of classes and graduations none of this is a peaceful protest threatening people intimidating people instilling fearing people is not peaceful protest it’s against the law descent is essential to democracy but descent must never lead to disorder or to denying the rights of others so students can finish the semester and their college education joining us on the set our foreign editor kin Gorges Don also our former White House correspondent L kavan um those remarks by Joe Biden unscheduled also his most extensive yet on these protests and the clashes absolutely and uh really we saw in that sound bite that uh his goal in this message was really to show support for freedom of speech for the right of these students to express uh their views but that there was a limit to that and that once there was violence then it was no longer protected speech if it ended up in vandalism so he was treading really a fine line trying to strike a balance between the support for the students but also a way to show that he uh was the president of Law and Order and there multiple reasons for why he decided to speak at this time first of all it’s because we’ve seen over the past few days whether it was at Columbia University in New York a couple of days ago or uh last night also uh at UCLA that these protests have increased in their violence in uh the clashes whether it was between protesters and counter-protesters or clashes with with law enforcement so there was a feeling that the president needed to speak because of this sort of change between peaceful demonstrations and uh violent uh clashes but also because he has come under extreme pressure from both sides of the aisle Republicans and his fellow democrats for staying silent so long in the face of uh these protests the right of course accusing him of being soft on uh Law and Order on the violence happening at these universities uh uh but but uh also uh soft on uh what they see as some of these protesters expressing anti-semitic positions in uh these protests the left also criticizing the president this time mostly for his position in support of uh the uh Israeli uh government with uh his its war on Gaza and this is of course also in context in an election year we’ve talked about even before these protests about how there was a a part of the younger voters who were expressing the possibility of not voting for Joe Biden because of his support for Israel it has to be said though that this uh student movement these protests the violent part is really a small part of the larger protest you mentioned 2,200 arrests over it seems about 40 University we’re talking about thousands of universities in the United States hundreds of thousands of students and a lot of these protests have managed to remain very peaceful including at places like Berkeley or Northwestern who have a tradition of uh these uh student protests and who have managed to keep them very peaceful at least for now yeah and part of what you learn at higher education in America is to stand up to Authority and kvan you and I have each studied at some of these institutions where these protests are playing out and you mentioned there is a Time onor tradition of student protest in American democracy absolutely and of course uh there is this feeling of looking back at uh history and trying to compare uh these different types of movements and uh one reason for that was the image uh at Columbia University when uh they stormed and broke into Hamilton Hall you have to look back to 1968 this was the height of the Civil Rights Movement the anti-vietnam war protest those students also storming and occupying Hamilton Hall so the parallels between history were right there uh it has to be said though that uh those comparisons really sort of end there at least when it comes to the scope of the protest their duration at least for now and also uh the violence that ensued in these protests if you look back at the 60s and the 70s uh during those protests there were some very violent occurrences 1970 was a pretty bad year there was a bombing at University of of Wisconsin uh there was also the K State massacre back then National Guard opening fire and killing at least four uh of the student protesters and at Jackson State just a few days later police forces killing two students in a dormatory firing at this dormatory you haven’t seen any of that uh these days uh also uh the difference is this time around actually law enforcement might be less violent but they moved in much much quicker and looking back to Hamilton Hall uh those students back in 1968 stayed there for nearly a week before law enforcement moved in to pull them out whereas at Columbia University it happened very very quickly so at least for now the parallels are a little bit easy to make uh experts are saying that the protest movement that is more comparable to what is happening right now is actually in the 80s uh the protest against South Africa’s a parthe policy

US President Joe Biden insisted Thursday that “order must prevail” on college campuses after weeks of turmoil, clashes with police and mass arrests involving student protests against Israel’s war with Hamas in Gaza. Biden, who had remained tight-lipped as the student unrest expanded, spoke just hours after hundreds of police moved in to forcibly clear a sprawling encampment at the University of California, Los Angeles, tearing down barriers and detaining more than 200 protestors.
#Gaza #US #UCLA

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21 comments

  2. Why there were no protests against Assad killing 500,000 Arabs in Syria ?
    …… ah yes, because Assad is not Jewish.

  3. In the 1948, Jewish population of Egypt was ~80,000.
    In December 2022, only 3 Egyptian Jews were living in Cairo.
    Where are all these Jewish people and their children?
    Do they have a right to return to their ancestral homes?

  6. “When the world looks at America, what it sees is an Israeli colony.” — Paul Craig Roberts

    Netanyahu: "Once we squeeze all we can out of the United States, it can dry up and blow away."

    "To learn who rules over you, simply find out who you are not allowed to criticize" Voltaire

  8. Palestinians have been victims of injustice for decades. Replace it in your life one day and experience it. Then you will feel its seriousness. Nothing but humanity is needed to resist injustice.

  11. The police is doing the violence disorder and vandalism together with zionist vandals. Pure lying by the government.

  15. When HK Rioters riot, US politicians encourage them and said it is good for Democracy. But now Joe Biden said this is wrong even the students is more peaceful then HK rioters. If France 24 and all other Main media are defender for Free Speech and independent, show us the prove/.

  17. Vote Biden for vice president n Ntanyahu for President!!! This is not paid advs by bidens sponsors somewre in d globe. The end of meaningful debate in US , use force n spies more effective.

  18. The powerful ISREAL LOBBY GROUP are in charge they are embarrassed by what's happening in the universities they want to shut things down its all over the international media. The ammunition factories have contracts to fulfill so no cease fire on the cards

  19. The "law and order" president ignoring his countries own laws with regards to providing weapons to states violating international law… Gives you a real sense of what he actually thinks

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