Tag Archive for: pro palestinian protests

Columbia Cancels Main Commencement Ceremony Amid Anti-Israel Protests

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Columbia University announced on Monday the cancellation of its main commencement ceremony following weeks of anti-Israel protests and encampments on campus.

Protestors — who are demanding the school boycott, divest and sanction Israel over its counteroffensive in Gaza following the Hamas terrorist attack — were threatened with suspensions last week if they did not remove themselves from the encampments. The Ivy League’s administration told students in a press release that it would forgo its university-wide commencement on May 15 to instead celebrate them “individually alongside their peers” via “Class Days and school-level ceremonies.”

“Our students emphasized that these smaller-scale, school-based celebrations are most meaningful to them and their families,” the press release reads. “They are eager to cross the stage to applause and family pride and hear from their school’s invited guest speakers. As a result, we will focus our resources on those school ceremonies and on keeping them safe, respectful, and running smoothly. A great deal of effort is already underway to reach that goal, and we understand the Deans and school teams are looking forward to working with their students to incorporate the most creative and meaningful ideas to celebrate this extraordinary moment.”

Pro-Palestinian protestors seized Columbia’s Hamilton Hall on Tuesday, with one employee reportedly claiming to have been held hostage inside the building. The New York Police Department made over 44 arrests, according to the New York Post.

The administration also announced that its remaining ceremonies will be relocated from Morningside campus, which is where Hamilton Hall is located.

“These past few weeks have been incredibly difficult for our community,” the press release reads. “Just as we are focused on making our graduation experience truly special, we continue to solicit student feedback and are looking at the possibility of a festive event on May 15 to take the place of the large, formal ceremony. We are eager to all come together for our graduates and celebrate our fellow Columbians as they, and we, look ahead to the future. We will share more in the coming days.”

Anti-Israel protests have popped up on college campuses across the country in recent weeks, including at Yale University, Emerson College, University of California, Los Angeles and the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill.

This is a breaking news story and will be updated.

AUTHOR

MARY LOU MASTERS

Contributor.

RELATED ARTICLE: Columbia University Shifts Classes Online After Pro-Palestinian Protest Takes Over Campus

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Police Arrest Over 100 Protesters At Emerson College As Pro-Palestinian Protests Flare Across Country

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Boston Police Department (BPD) arrested over 100 pro-Palestinian protesters Wednesday evening at Emerson College, the Daily Caller News Foundation confirmed.

Students have been protesting since Sunday and created an encampment in an alleyway partially owned by the college despite being warned that they were in violation of city ordinances, according to CBS News Boston. Police made a total of 108 arrests and broke up the encampment after warning protesters again to leave the area, a BPD spokesperson told the DCNF.

“108 arrests, 4 injured officers, 3 minor, 1 more serious. All non-life threatening,” the spokesperson said. “No protestors in custody have reported injuries at this time. Protestors will be arraigned in Boston Municipal Court.”

The department did not elaborate on whether the protesters had been released or what they were being charged with. The school has not made a statement on the arrests but classes were canceled Thursday, according to CBS News Boston.

The administration urged protesters in a statement Wednesday to abide by city laws and clear out the encampment, according to an announcement to the school.

“Most notably, the Commissioners expressed that the tents occupying Boylston Place Alley violate city ordinances prohibiting tents in a public right-of-way,” the announcement reads. “They also noted alleged violations involving blocking pedestrian access to the alley, public noise violations, and ongoing reports of fire hazards posed by blocking doors and hydrants. These are not Emerson College rules but laws and ordinances enforced by the city and the commonwealth.”

The college also noted that it had received reports that there had been “targeted harassment and intimidation of Jewish supporters of Israel and students, staff, faculty, and neighbors seeking to pass through the alley” from protesters and that this behavior was “unacceptable,” according to the school’s announcement.

Pro-Palestinian protests have been erupting across the country following the arrest of nearly 100 students at Columbia University who were protesting the school’s ties to Israel. Multiple groups at Yale, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, among others, have started encampments, calling for the universities to meet their demands to boycott, divest and sanction Israel over its war with Hamas.

Hamas launched an attack on Israel on Oct. 7 killing over 1,200 people and taking over 250 hostages, including Americans.

Emerson did not immediately respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.

AUTHOR

KATE ANDERSON

Contributor.

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All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

‘No Tech For Apartheid’: Google Workers Protest Company’s Services To Israel

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A group of Google employees protested Tuesday in California and New York against the information technology corporation’s provision of cloud computing services to Israel, according to reports.

The protesters in Google’s Sunnyvale, California location entered the office of Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian Tuesday morning and said they would leave only if Google would withdraw from Project Nimbus, a $1.2 billion joint contract with Amazon to provide cloud services and data centers to the Israeli government, the Washington Post reported.

A similar protest took place in a common space within Google’s New York office, Zelda Montes, one of the protesters, told the outlet. A banner reading “Google Worker Sit-In”, “Against Project Nimbus”, and “No Tech for Genocide” hung above the common space, the outlet revealed.

A protester wore a T-shirt sporting the slogans “Googler against Genocide” and “No Tech for Apartheid” according to Gizmodo.

The provision of public cloud services to the Israeli government is the first of five “central layers” of the “multi-year, large-scale flagship project” that started in 2019, according to Israel’s Government Procurement Administration. Google and Amazon shrugged off Microsoft, Oracle and IBM, the other tenderers who also bid for the contract, in Apr. 2021, Reuters reported.

Protests from within Google and Amazon have erupted in various forms since then. More than 90 Google employees and more than 300 Amazon employees collectively signed an anonymous Oct. 2021 letter accusing the companies of “aggressively” pursuing military and law enforcement contracts that “are part of a disturbing pattern of militarization, lack of transparency and avoidance of oversight.” They called on both companies to “pull out of Project Nimbus and cut all ties with the Israeli military.”

Two months after Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 terror attack on Israel, workers staged a “die-in” at Google’s downtown San Francisco offices to protest against Israel’s reported use of what appeared to be a separate artificial intelligence program—termed “the Gospel”—in its military response to Hamas, according to the San Francisco (SF) Chronicle.

Google fired an employee who heckled the corporation’s top executive in Israel during a conference in New York in March, leading Montes to contemplate the possibility of being fired, too, according to the Washington Post report. “I have been waiting for months for people to be in the same position as me and be ready to put their job on the line,” Montes told the outlet in part.

Montes also reportedly alleged that Google lied to its employees about Project Nimbus.

A Google spokesperson reportedly told the SF Chronicle that Project Nimbus was a public service program, not a military one.

AUTHOR

JOHN OYEWALE

Contributor.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.