Columbia University inspires national protest wave, swift response by authorities

The swift response by police in Princeton came hours after Boston police forcibly removed a pro-Palestinian encampment set up by Emerson College students early on Thursday, arresting more than 100 people, media accounts and police said.

The tents, on a walkway next to the college in downtown Boston, were removed shortly after 1.00am, police said. Videos posted online show helmeted police officers squaring off with people with interlocking arms.

At Northwestern University, students began erecting tents on the campus just north of Chicago as they called for the school to protect pro-Palestine speakers and end relationships with Israeli institutions, organisers said.

“We refuse to allow business to continue as usual in the face of Northwestern’s complicity,” the NU Educators for Justice in Palestine, Student Liberation Union and Jewish Voice for Peace said in a joint statement.  

Tents were also being erected on Thursday morning at George Washington University in Washington, DC, where a group of protesters chanted “It is our right to rebel, divest now or go to hell,” video footage posted on social media showed.