Activists occupy Columbia University building | DW News

Activists occupy Columbia University building | DW News

We Begin the day with protesters and police in the United States on campuses across the country police have begun arresting people connected to Pro Palestinian protests more than 11,00 people have been detained since the first campus demonstration now that was two weeks ago at Columbia University in New York City and that is where the situation escalated on Tuesday Pro Palestinian demonstrators barricaded Hamilton Hall a building well known for being occupied during demonst ations against the Vietnam war in the 1960s well today Columbia University said that it will expel students who have occupied the building the president believes that forcibly taking over a building on campus um is absolutely the wrong approach that is not an example of peaceful protest and of course as we you’ve rightly noted hate speech and hate symbols also have no place in this country a small percentage of of students shouldn’t be able to disrupt the academic experience the legitimate study uh for the rest of the student body I’m not aware of any evidence uh either in the intelligence world or uh through law enforcement about Bad actors this is not protected Free Speech what this is doing is violating the rights of others Jewish students who are merely on campus trying to get an education who are playing by the rules they can’t they’re impeded from going to class they’re impeded they’re told not to come onto the University campus where they are paying tuition and they have valid ID cards to be when when you when you cross the that Rubicon and you and you begin to threaten the lives and intimidate and harass people to the point where they cannot engage in their freedom then that is and for more on the protest I’m joined Now by Ethan bman he’s an adjunct professor at Lola law school in Los Angeles he also hosted his own radio talk show focusing on current events especially in the United States that’s where we got to know Ethan Ethan it’s good to have you back on the program talk to me if you would about the student protest situation in California where you are well it is widespread it’s at UCLA USC it’s in San Francisco at Berkeley it’s at a campus called UC Humbolt um they’ve been relatively intense UCLA has kind of B breached into a minority of the pro protesters there who have are not just protesting the war in Israel and Gaza but have gone after uh Jewish students as well which has become problematic and I I will be very curious to see how the Department of Education approaches what the universities who receive federal funding will do in the future I want to talk about that in just a moment let me ask you first though how do you explain the Genesis of these student protests I mean it was only two weeks ago when the first protest began on the campus of Columbia University in New York City has it been that long well there’s conflicting reports about The Genesis whether or not uh there clearly for many decades are U strong anti-war sentiments on college campuses particularly here in the state of California uh they really grew out of the 1960s up at Berkeley in San Francisco Bay area and so that has always been here but there has been some speculation and I don’t know if there’s any anything founded in it but that there might be outside influences that are um helping to organize some of these protests or some of the non students who are um coming on to campuses that are maybe not just straight anti-war protesters but they have definitely grown and they are causing their own set of issues because the first amendment is not an unlimited am mment there are limits and especially on private property there are definitely limits to what protesters can do um you bring up a good point that a lot of the people that we have seen on college campuses they they may not be students the people all the people that we see protesting um we assume most of them are that in mind Columbia University it has one of the largest Jewish student populations of any college or university in the US um this is where calls to vest from Israel seem to have found the loudest voice does that surprise you it doesn’t necessarily surprise me um I think it’s a it’s deeply disturbing though however when you bring up that specific point about the Jewish population Columbia University used to have a Jewish quota all the way into the 1960s so we talk about civil rights in the United States it wasn’t just uh uh the black population that was redlined in the United States it was also the Jewish population and so the Civil Rights Movement was actually a combination led by black leaders like Reverend Martin Luther King Jr but Jewish leaders were a key part of the Civil Rights Movement so to see this happening at Colombia and in particular I haven’t heard anybody else point this out yet Alexander Hamilton was the most pro-jewish Founding Father of the United States and that’s the hall that they happen to have taken over at Columbia is Hamilton Hall yeah that Hall was also um a a focal point for student protests during the Vietnam War as well at Columbia University um you and I have talked about this before you are Jewish and when you look at what’s happening right now there are claims of anti-Semitism I mean there are chance that we are hearing that we can’t repeat on the air here that are considered anti-semitic here in Germany um and this is happening on college campuses in America where people traditionally have expected you to find a hot bed of liberal thinking how did this happen well that that is something that sociologists will want to spend some time dissecting in the future as we look back at what is happening today but for too many Jewish people in the United States it does feel reminiscent of the early 1930s the breaking of windows at Hamilton Hall um the trapping of uh of Jewish students so they cannot enter uh buildings this is deeply resonant with the many Jews in the United States it’s very upsetting to many Jews um so while the majority of protesters I believe are acting in good faith and what they believe to be an anti-war stance there definitely is a percentage whether they’re students or outside agitators that are bringing in a strong anti-jewish sentiment maybe if you could explain um from an American point of view Ethan American Jewish point of view we have seen Jewish students at Colombia interviewed who are part of the protest who say that they are protesting and that they are anti-zionists saying that you can be an anti-zionist and not be anti-semitic does that compute with you no and anytime you can always find an example of an isolated uh individual who it does not represent the group um Jews are zionists almost the the almost the total majority it’s greater than 95% as high as 99% in various polls it’s a core to our belief system so when I hear the term anti-zionist Jew that’s antithetical um we just had Passover pesak at the Seder which is a a reminder of The Exodus we talk about returning to Jerusalem this is from thousands of years ago so when I hear anti-zionist Jew that might be what they believe but it’s not a core Jewish belief in any way shape or form Ethan bman giving us valuable insights into what is happening across the United States on college campuses at the moment Ethan thank you thanks so much BR tww correspondent correspondent Benjamin Alvarez Gruber is at Columbia University in front of Hamilton Hall again that occupied campus Building Benjamin this occupation is a new escalation in these protests what can you tell us about the situation there so more and more police are arriving the cordin of the area that you can see here behind me there are several groups of protesters that have gathered over the evening and just on the side of this protest is the only entrance to campus were essential stuff but also the students that live inside of Campus can enter and can exit camp campus grounds all other members of the university community are currently bured as well as media so we have to wait outside to see how this is unfolding but of course pressure is mounting on the president of Columbia University is while NYPD New York police department sayate they will wait until H the president or those who are in charge of the University tell them to actually get their support to send the students out they have said that they will suspend them and we’ve also had some reports on that but we’re still waiting on confirmation tonight how many of the students that are currently occupying the building that you can see behind me have been suspended from University now Benjamin the university has uh now said that it will expel some of these students it talked before about suspension uh how can we talk about how is it reacting ac across the course of these protests so what university said they sent out several statements today one of them saying that the work of the University cannot be endlessly interrupted by protesters who violate the rules quite similar to the criticism we heard from the White House from Washington today a statement where they said that forcibly taking over buildings is not peaceful it is wrong so we can expect that that will also increase as the pressure is mounting on both sides on one side we have Jewish um students and Jewish faculty members we talked to some of them over the past couple of days who who say that they feel threatened and they want the university to take concrete steps to take over the building again but for now no decision has been taken we’ve seen other universities taking different decisions sending law enforcement police officers into campus ground to expel the students but for now here at Columbia University that has not happened based on what you’re seeing How likely is it that we could see the university call in police to clear those protests there was something that happened that it actually sparked and made this movement even bigger replicating to other colleges and also universities the president and the the administ those are in charge of the University also know what the pictures will look like so they are waiting but others we had the Speaker of the House of Representative Mike Johnson coming to Columbia University a few days ago even calling for the National Guard to be sent in so we can be sure that many are asking for the president of the university in Colombia to act quicker not to send out statements but also um let these protesters to expel them and to also have the suspensions but as we see and hear from the students are inside they say they will not back down they will continue protesting aski Columbia University to divest from all the companies that according to them profit from Israel’s war in Gaza all right DW correspond correspondent Benjamin Alvarez Gruber at Columbia University in New York City thank you very much

Columbia University officials threatened academic expulsion of students who seized and occupied a classroom building, intensifying a nearly two-week standoff between administrators and pro-Palestinian activists on the Manhattan campus.

Chapters:
00:00 Introduction
01:48 Ethan Bearman, Adjunct Professor at Loyola Law School
08:24 Benjamin Alvarez Gruber, DW Correspondent

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