Hundreds of Pro-Palestinian Student Protesters Arrested at U.S. Campuses

Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at pro-Palestinian protests at U.S. universities, extensive flooding in East Africa, and Russia vetoing a U.N. resolution on nuclear weapons in space.

U.S. University Arrests

Police this week arrested hundreds of pro-Palestinian student demonstrators on college campuses across the United States as university administrators struggle to find a balance between allowing free speech and maintaining a safe environment for all students and faculty.

Among students’ demands, they have urged their universities to stop investing in companies that provide support to Israel and to cut ties with Israeli academic institutions as well as called for a cease-fire in Gaza and the creation of an independent Palestinian state. Although reports suggest that the protests have been largely nonviolent, some students and faculty—including many who are Jewish—have reported feeling intimidated or unsafe because of the demonstrations and even being targeted in antisemitic attacks.

Photos and videos have circulated on social media of protesters in some instances expressing antisemitic slogans and support for Hamas’s deadly assault on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. Some activist groups involved in organizing the protests have made public statements denying antisemitism and saying their criticism is reserved for the Israeli state and its supporters.

The protests gained national attention last Wednesday at Columbia University in New York City after students formed an encampment on campus to demand that the school stop its “continued financial investment in corporations that profit from Israeli apartheid, genocide, and military occupation of Palestine,” including companies involved in weapons manufacturing.

The protests came the same day that Columbia University President Minouche Shafik testified before a U.S. House of Representatives committee about how the school responds to charges of antisemitism on campus. Shafik was the latest university president to face criticism for allegedly failing to combat antisemitism, with House Republicans interrogating the presidents of Harvard University, the University of Pennsylvania, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on their policies late last year. Harvard and Penn’s presidents have since resigned after evading questions about whether students should be punished for calling for the genocide of Jews.

Seemingly in recognition of the spotlight on her, Shafik requested that New York police disband the school’s pro-Palestinian encampment, saying students were trespassing and threatening the university’s security. More than 100 people were arrested. The Columbia Law School Human Rights Institute condemned the arrests, and the school’s newspaper, the Columbia Daily Spectator, compared the incident to crackdowns on the university’s anti-war protesters in 1968.

Since then, solidarity protests have arisen at universities across the country, and many have been met with similar police responses that have seen hundreds of students and faculty arrested. Some schools have canceled classes or moved them online.

The tumult has also reignited an ongoing national conversation about free speech—and its limits—on university campuses and beyond that has seen high-profile politicians weigh in. Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar, whose daughter was arrested during last Thursday’s demonstration at Columbia, has expressed support for the protesters. On Wednesday, U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson and several of his fellow Republican lawmakers held a press conference at Columbia calling on the school’s president, Shafik, to resign “if she cannot immediately bring order to this chaos.” He was met with boos from nearby protesters.

U.S. President Joe Biden told reporters on Monday that he condemns the “antisemitic protests” but added, “I also condemn those who don’t understand what’s going on with the Palestinians.” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said on Wednesday that Biden believes in the importance of free speech, debate, and nondiscrimination on college campuses, adding that “students should feel safe.”

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What We’re Following

Climate woes. Torrential rain and flash floods have wreaked havoc across East Africa this week. On Thursday, Tanzanian Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa said at least 155 people had been killed and more than 230 others injured, urging anyone living in low-lying areas to seek higher ground. Officials report that the storm has affected around 200,000 people and damaged more than 10,000 homes. Majaliwa blamed the El Niño climate pattern for worsening the country’s rainy season.

In Kenya, at least 38 people have been killed and more than 40,000 others displaced in the flooding, over 30,000 of whom were living in Nairobi. Thousands of acres of crops have also been destroyed, and at least 118 inmates at a facility near the capital escaped on Wednesday after heavy rains damaged the prison. Local government is “clearly overwhelmed,” Edwin Sifuna, the Nairobi County senator, wrote on X. The nation’s Interior Ministry announced on Thursday that government agencies were beginning a joint operation to conduct search and rescue operations and evacuate those at risk.

Weapons in space. Russia vetoed a United Nations resolution on Wednesday that called on all countries not to develop or deploy nuclear arms or other weapons of mass destruction into space. This would reaffirm a principle established in the 1967 Outer Space Treaty. The United States and Japan co-sponsored the draft, which only Moscow out of the U.N. Security Council’s 15 members voted against; China abstained.

Russia’s U.N. ambassador, Vassily Nebenzia, condemned the draft as “absolutely absurd and politicized,” arguing that it doesn’t go far enough in banning all types of space weapons. Moscow and China co-proposed an amendment “to prevent for all time the placement of weapons in outer space, and the threat of use of force in outer spaces.” Seven council members voted against that measure, including Washington.

In response, U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan on Wednesday reiterated previous claims that Russia “is developing a new satellite carrying a nuclear device.” Russian President Vladimir Putin has said the Kremlin is “categorically against” the use of such weapons in space.

State-backed executions. Human Rights Watch published a report on Thursday accusing Burkinabe forces of killing at least 223 civilians in February. The massacres took place in two northern villages during a state-backed counterinsurgency campaign against people who allegedly collaborated with Islamists who attacked a military camp near the provincial capital, Ouahigouya. At least 56 children were among the dead.

More than 20,000 people have been killed in Burkina Faso since jihadi violence emerged there around nine years ago, with many Islamist fighters linked to al Qaeda or the Islamic State. Capt. Ibrahim Traoré, who seized power in a military coup in September 2022, promised to combat militant violence, but the army itself has been responsible for numerous atrocities. Last November, state forces killed at least 70 people, including infants, for allegedly cooperating with militants.

Odds and Ends

Namibian authorities have blacklisted three foreign tourists from entering the country’s national parks after they posed naked at Big Daddy dune, one of Namibia’s top attractions. “It is very sickening, and it really [creates] a bad image for Namibia,” Kenneth Nependa, the vice chair of the Federation of Namibian Tourism Associations, told the Namibian Sun. Public indecency is punishable under Namibian law; however, some people argued that there’s nothing wrong with a little sunbathing.