In pictures: Riot police remove pro-Palestine protesters from Columbia campus

A PRO-PALESTINE demonstration at Columbia University ended on Tuesday night, as riot police burst into a building occupied by demonstrators and made dozens of arrests.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the US, clashes broke out between rival groups at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) early on Wednesday,

New York City officers entered Columbia’s campus late on Tuesday after the university requested help, according to a statement.

A tent encampment in the grounds was cleared, along with Hamilton Hall, where a stream of officers used a ladder to climb through a second-floor window.

Protesters calling on the Ivy League university to stop doing business with Israel or companies that support the war in Gaza had seized the hall about 20 hours earlier.

“After the university learned overnight that Hamilton Hall had been occupied, vandalised, and blockaded, we were left with no choice,” the statement said.

“The decision to reach out to the NYPD was in response to the actions of the protesters, not the cause they are championing. We have made it clear that the life of campus cannot be endlessly interrupted by protesters who violate the rules and the law.”

Police spokesman Carlos Nieves said he had no immediate reports of any injuries.

READ MORE: Pro-Palestine activists set up 'solidarity camp' at Holyrood

The arrests occurred after protesters ignored an earlier ultimatum to abandon the encampment on Monday or be suspended, and unfolded as other universities stepped up efforts to end demonstrations that were inspired by Columbia.

Fabien Lugo, a first-year accounting student who said he was not involved in the protests, said he opposed the university’s decision to call in police.

“This is too intense,” he said. “It feels like more of an escalation than a de-escalation.”

Meanwhile, violence broke out at UCLA overnight as pro-Israeli protesters arrived at the scene. Police in riot gear attended but did not immediately intervene.

Mary Osako, a senior UCLA official, told campus newspaper the Daily Bruin: “Horrific acts of violence occurred at the encampment tonight and we immediately called law enforcement for mutual aid support.”

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass spoke to the university’s chancellor and said police would respond to the school’s request, according to a post on Twitter/X from her spokesman, Zach Seidl.

The clashes took place just outside a tent encampment, where pro-Palestinian protesters erected barricades and plywood for protection – and counter-protesters tried to pull them down.

Security was tightened at the campus on Tuesday after officials said there were “physical altercations” between the groups.

Police have swept through other campuses across the US over the last two weeks, leading to confrontations and more than 1000 arrests.

In rarer instances, university officials and protest leaders have struck agreements to limit the disruption to campus life and forthcoming commencement ceremonies.

READ MORE: BAE Systems Glasgow blockaded amid Palestine protest

Just blocks away from Columbia, at The City College of New York, demonstrators were in a stand-off with police outside the public college’s main gate.

Video posted on social media by news reporters on the scene late on Tuesday showed officers putting some people to the ground and shoving others as they cleared people from the street and pavements. Many detained protesters were driven away on city buses.

After police arrived, officers lowered a Palestinian flag on the City College flagpole, balled it up and tossed it to the ground before raising an American flag.

Brown University, another member of the Ivy League, reached an agreement with protesters on its Rhode Island campus on Tuesday.

Demonstrators said they would close their encampment in exchange for administrators taking a vote to consider divestment from Israel in October. The compromise appeared to mark the first time a US college has agreed to vote on divestment in the wake of the protests.

Columbia’s police action happened on the 56th anniversary of a similar move to quash an occupation of Hamilton Hall by students protesting racism and the Vietnam War.

Earlier on Tuesday, the police department said officers would not enter the grounds unless at the college administration’s request or for an imminent emergency. Now, law enforcement will be there until May 17, the end of the university’s commencement events.

In a letter to senior NYPD officials, Columbia President Minouche Shafik said the administration made the request that police remove protesters from the occupied building and a nearby tent encampment “with the utmost regret”.

She also referred to the idea, first suggested by New York City Mayor Eric Adams earlier in the day, that the group that occupied Hamilton was “led by individuals who are not affiliated with the university”.

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Neither provided specific evidence to back up that contention, which was disputed by protest organisers and participants.

NYPD officials made similar claims about “outside agitators” during the huge, grassroots demonstrations against racial injustice that erupted across the city after the death of George Floyd in 2020.

In some instances, top police officials falsely labelled peaceful marches organised by well-known neighbourhood activists as the work of violent extremists.

Before officers arrived at Columbia, the White House condemned the stand-offs there and at California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt, where protesters had occupied two buildings for more than a week until officers with batons intervened early on Tuesday and arrested 25 people.

President Joe Biden believes students occupying an academic building is “absolutely the wrong approach”, said National Security Council spokesman John Kirby.

Later, former president Donald Trump phoned in to Sean Hannity’s show on Fox News Channel to comment on Columbia’s turmoil as live footage of police clearing Hamilton Hall aired.

Trump praised the officers, “but it should never have gotten to this”, he said.

The nationwide campus protests began at Columbia in response to Israel’s offensive in Gaza after Hamas launched a deadly attack on southern Israel on October 7, killing about 1200 people and taking roughly 250 hostages.

Vowing to stamp out Hamas, Israel has now killed more than 34,000 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, according to the local health ministry.

Israel and its supporters have branded the university protests antisemitic, while Israel’s critics say it uses those allegations to silence opposition.

Although some protesters have been caught on camera making antisemitic remarks or violent threats, organisers of the protests, some of whom are Jewish, say it is a peaceful movement aimed at defending Palestinian rights and protesting over the war.