At least nine arrested as police dismantle pro-Palestinian encampment at MIT
At least nine people were arrested at a pro-Palestinian encampment at MIT on Thursday after the university's president, Dr. Sally Kornbluth, ordered students to leave earlier in the week. File Photo by Will Oliver/EPA-EFE
May 10 (UPI) -- Authorities arrested at least nine Massachusetts Institute of Technology students as they dismantled a pro-Palestinian encampment on the Cambridge campus.
MIT President Sally Kornbluth warned student protesters, who had joined with hundreds of others to call for MIT to end research contracts with Israel's Ministry of Defense, to leave the Kresge lawn where the encampment was set up by Monday afternoon.
MIT had already suspended dozens of students with their cases being referred to its Committee on Discipline for refusing to clear the tent site when originally ordered.
Protesters returned to the encampment and held an "emergency" rally Thursday in support of those who faced punishment, organized by the MIT Graduate Student Union which some of the students arrested on Thursday belong to.
"We must fight back to defend our coworkers now," the message said.
"We are not going to stop acting," MIT student Quinn Perian told WCVB-TV. "We are not going to stop letting the institution know that there is no life as normal -- there is no life as normal in Gaza. We are going to continue showing everyone that this complicity in a genocide is not acceptable."
The MIT arrests are part of aggressive actions taken by college administrations to shut down encampments created by pro-Palestinian protesters at campus around the country. The encampments have picked up in the spring with many protesters calling on universities to divest from Israeli institutions.
At least nine people were arrested at a pro-Palestinian encampment at MIT on Thursday after the university's president, Dr. Sally Kornbluth, ordered students to leave earlier in the week. File Photo by Will Oliver/EPA-EFE
May 10 (UPI) -- Authorities arrested at least nine Massachusetts Institute of Technology students as they dismantled a pro-Palestinian encampment on the Cambridge campus.
MIT President Sally Kornbluth warned student protesters, who had joined with hundreds of others to call for MIT to end research contracts with Israel's Ministry of Defense, to leave the Kresge lawn where the encampment was set up by Monday afternoon.
MIT had already suspended dozens of students with their cases being referred to its Committee on Discipline for refusing to clear the tent site when originally ordered.
Protesters returned to the encampment and held an "emergency" rally Thursday in support of those who faced punishment, organized by the MIT Graduate Student Union which some of the students arrested on Thursday belong to.
"We must fight back to defend our coworkers now," the message said.
"We are not going to stop acting," MIT student Quinn Perian told WCVB-TV. "We are not going to stop letting the institution know that there is no life as normal -- there is no life as normal in Gaza. We are going to continue showing everyone that this complicity in a genocide is not acceptable."
The MIT arrests are part of aggressive actions taken by college administrations to shut down encampments created by pro-Palestinian protesters at campus around the country. The encampments have picked up in the spring with many protesters calling on universities to divest from Israeli institutions.
Police dismantled protest camps and arrested dozens of pro-Palestinian activists at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Pennsylvania on Friday, in the latest crackdowns on demonstrations roiling U.S. campuses.
Philadelphia officers in riot gear pushed reporters away from the encampment at the University of Pennsylvania before tearing down tents and tossing the belongings of protesters in a trash truck, the student newspaper reported. About 33 people were arrested on the Ivy League campus, Penn’s public safety department said.
A similar scene unfolded simultaneously at MIT near Boston, where student journalists reported that riot police arrested at least 10 student protesters before flattening the encampment and discarding their belongings.
The dawn raids were the latest efforts by school and local authorities to end such demonstrations at dozens of universities around the country.
Many university leaders have called the encampments safety hazards and sought to end them ahead of May commencement ceremonies, which draw large crowds of outside visitors to campuses.
Officials at Harvard University on Friday began issuing suspensions to students who were involved in an encampment on the Ivy League school’s Cambridge, Massachusetts, campus, according to an Instagram post by the school’s Palestine Solidarity Committee.
On Monday, Interim Harvard President Alan Garber said the encampment was disrupting the educational environment as students were taking final exams and preparing for commencement. He said participants faced suspension, restricting them from campus and possibly barring them from taking exams and residing in university housing.
“Disciplinary procedures and administrative referrals for placing protesters on involuntary leave continue to move forward,” a school spokesperson said in a statement on Friday, without specifying the number of students suspended.
‘INCREASINGLY UNTENABLE’
The protesting students are demanding a cease-fire in Israel’s incursion into Gaza and have demanded their schools divest from companies with ties to Israel.
One New York City school affiliated with Columbia University – where protests inspired the nationwide wave of demonstrations – said on Thursday that its board of trustees had endorsed students’ divestment calls.
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The Union Theological Seminary said in a statement it had decided “to withdraw support from companies profiting from the war” after months of research into its investment portfolio. It added that “our investments in the war in Palestine are small because our previous, strong anti-armament screens are robust.”
A similar step was taken by Evergreen State College in Washington state earlier this week, after officials agreed that a college committee would start proposing strategies for “divestment from companies that profit from gross human rights violations and/or the occupation of Palestinian territories.”
The agreement was signed by Evergreen representatives and students on Tuesday, and protesters cleared the encampment themselves on Wednesday, according to local news reports.
MIT President Sally Kornbluth said that the 10 individuals arrested on Friday peacefully had submitted to police, but that the arrests came after escalating clashes between pro-Palestinian and pro-Israeli protesters.
“It was not heading in a direction anyone could call peaceful,” she said in a statement, adding that “the cost and disruption for the community overall made the situation increasingly untenable.”
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Penn Interim President J. Larry Jameson said earlier this week that “every day the encampment exists, the campus is less safe,” citing reports of harassing and threatening speech, the defacement of campus landmarks, and a video of a student being denied entry to the encampment.
Since the first mass arrests at Columbia on April 18, at least 2,600 demonstrators have been detained at more than 100 protests in 39 states and Washington, D.C., according to The Appeal, a nonprofit news organization. Some policing experts say such sweeping detentions can be counter-productive, fueling protests rather than deterring them.
Similar protests have sprung up at campuses in other countries. In western Canada, police removed protesters from an encampment at the University of Calgary on Thursday, using “non-lethal munitions,” according to a statement from the city, which said the number of arrests would be made public on Friday.
Reuters
May 10 (Reuters) - Police dismantled protest camps and arrested dozens of pro-Palestinian activists at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Pennsylvania on Friday, in the latest crackdowns on demonstrations roiling U.S. campuses.
Philadelphia officers in riot gear pushed reporters away from the encampment at the University of Pennsylvania before tearing down tents and tossing the belongings of protesters in a trash truck, the student newspaper reported. About 33 people were arrested on the Ivy League campus, Penn's public safety department said.
Cornell University President Martha Pollack resigns amid widespread campus turmoil
After a tumultuous last six months, Cornell University President Martha Pollack is resigning, ending a 7-year tenure at the Ivy League institution, as pro-Palestinian and pro-Israel demonstrations have taken hold on campuses (Columbia University pictured) across the United States. File Pool photo by Mary Altaffer/UPI | License Photo
May 10 (UPI) -- Cornell University President Martha Pollack announced she plans to resign, ending a 7-year tenure at the Ivy League institution.
Pollack, 65, confirmed that her last official day on the job will be June 30, in an open letter published Friday on the university's website.
"It is only after extensive reflection that I have determined that this is the right decision," Pollack wrote in the letter, adding she initially made the decision last December but pushed pause because of "events on our and/or on other campuses."
"But continued delay is not in the university's best interests, both because of the need to have sufficient time for a smooth transition before the start of the coming academic year, and because I do not want my announcement to interfere with the celebration of our newest graduates at Commencement in just a few weeks," she wrote.
She also downplayed any suggestion of being forced out.
"I understand that there will be lots of speculation about my decision, so let me be as clear as I can: This decision is mine and mine alone," Pollack wrote in the letter.
"After seven fruitful and gratifying years as Cornell's president -- and after a career in research and academia spanning five decades -- I'm ready for a new chapter in my life."
Pollack did not directly mention any incidents involving the university, but it was one of several placed on a list of institutions being investigated by the Department of Education for Discrimination.
In November, a Cornell student was arrested for posting anti-Semitic threats against the Ivy League school's Jewish community. Federal officials later charged the 21-year-old man with "posting threats to kill or injure another using interstate communications."
Cornell, along with fellow Ivy League institutions Columbia University and the University of Pennsylvania, are being investigated after the department announced in November it was looking into five complaints alleging anti-Semitic harassment and two alleging anti-Muslim harassment.
Several American universities have canceled or toned down graduations as a result, to avoid potential unrest.
University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill resigned from her post a month later amid the fallout and harsh criticism.
Pro-Palestinian and pro-Israel demonstrations have taken hold on campuses across the United States, leading different reactions from different institutions.
"There is so much more to Cornell than the current turmoil taking place at universities across the country right now, and I hope we do not lose sight of that," Pollack wrote.
Pollack's resignation comes after University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill resigned in December following testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives on responding to anti-Semitism on university campuses. Harvard University President Claudine Gay who also testified at that hearing and faced accusations of plagiarism resigned in January.
"There will be plenty more to do over the coming months and years. Higher education has come under attack from many quarters, and our core values have faced enormous pressure," Pollack wrote.
"Indeed, if I have one piece of advice for the Cornell community going forward, it is this: We must develop more capacity to seek out different perspectives and be willing to listen to those with whom we differ, doing so with intellectual curiosity and an open mind; at the same time, we must always consider the impact of what we say to one another; and we must thoughtfully engage in debate."
After a tumultuous last six months, Cornell University President Martha Pollack is resigning, ending a 7-year tenure at the Ivy League institution, as pro-Palestinian and pro-Israel demonstrations have taken hold on campuses (Columbia University pictured) across the United States. File Pool photo by Mary Altaffer/UPI | License Photo
May 10 (UPI) -- Cornell University President Martha Pollack announced she plans to resign, ending a 7-year tenure at the Ivy League institution.
Pollack, 65, confirmed that her last official day on the job will be June 30, in an open letter published Friday on the university's website.
"It is only after extensive reflection that I have determined that this is the right decision," Pollack wrote in the letter, adding she initially made the decision last December but pushed pause because of "events on our and/or on other campuses."
"But continued delay is not in the university's best interests, both because of the need to have sufficient time for a smooth transition before the start of the coming academic year, and because I do not want my announcement to interfere with the celebration of our newest graduates at Commencement in just a few weeks," she wrote.
She also downplayed any suggestion of being forced out.
"I understand that there will be lots of speculation about my decision, so let me be as clear as I can: This decision is mine and mine alone," Pollack wrote in the letter.
"After seven fruitful and gratifying years as Cornell's president -- and after a career in research and academia spanning five decades -- I'm ready for a new chapter in my life."
Pollack did not directly mention any incidents involving the university, but it was one of several placed on a list of institutions being investigated by the Department of Education for Discrimination.
In November, a Cornell student was arrested for posting anti-Semitic threats against the Ivy League school's Jewish community. Federal officials later charged the 21-year-old man with "posting threats to kill or injure another using interstate communications."
Cornell, along with fellow Ivy League institutions Columbia University and the University of Pennsylvania, are being investigated after the department announced in November it was looking into five complaints alleging anti-Semitic harassment and two alleging anti-Muslim harassment.
Several American universities have canceled or toned down graduations as a result, to avoid potential unrest.
University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill resigned from her post a month later amid the fallout and harsh criticism.
Pro-Palestinian and pro-Israel demonstrations have taken hold on campuses across the United States, leading different reactions from different institutions.
"There is so much more to Cornell than the current turmoil taking place at universities across the country right now, and I hope we do not lose sight of that," Pollack wrote.
Pollack's resignation comes after University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill resigned in December following testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives on responding to anti-Semitism on university campuses. Harvard University President Claudine Gay who also testified at that hearing and faced accusations of plagiarism resigned in January.
"There will be plenty more to do over the coming months and years. Higher education has come under attack from many quarters, and our core values have faced enormous pressure," Pollack wrote.
"Indeed, if I have one piece of advice for the Cornell community going forward, it is this: We must develop more capacity to seek out different perspectives and be willing to listen to those with whom we differ, doing so with intellectual curiosity and an open mind; at the same time, we must always consider the impact of what we say to one another; and we must thoughtfully engage in debate."
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