Hundreds of students have been arrested and face expulsion in universities across the United States as students continue to hold demonstrations demanding an end to Israel’s genocidal war in the besieged Gaza Strip.
American media reports said police were out in full force on college campuses on Saturday, some using chemical irritants and Tasers to disperse the students condemning Israeli atrocities in Gaza over the past seven months.
In Boston, police detained about 100 people while clearing a protest camp at Northeastern University, with social media posts showing security forces in riot gear and officers loading tents onto the back of a truck.
In Bloomington in the Midwest, the Indiana University Police Department arrested 23 people as they cleared a campus protest camp, according to reports by the Indiana Daily Student newspaper.
The Arizona State University Police Department arrested 69 people for trespassing after the group set up what was claimed to be an “unauthorized encampment” on campus and ignored repeated orders to disperse.
Moreover, at least 80 people were arrested at Washington University in St. Louis, including US presidential candidate Jill Stein and her campaign manager.
Various videos have also emerged from different US states showing hundreds of students – and even faculty members – being forcefully arrested as they demanded amnesty for students and faculty members disciplined or fired for protesting over the past days.
In the past 10 days, hundreds of students have been arrested, suspended, put on probation and, in some cases, expelled from colleges, including Yale University, the University of Southern California, Vanderbilt University and the University of Minnesota.
More than 20 universities in the US and several others in Europe are protesting against the Washington-backed Israeli onslaught, which has killed over 34,000 people since October last year.
The students are calling for universities to separate themselves from any companies that are advancing the occupying regime’s war on the besieged Palestinian territory.
The United States has been providing Israel with unrestrained military, intelligence, and financial support since October 7, when the regime unleashed the war against the besieged Palestinian enclave.
Washington gives Israel $3.8 billion in military assistance every year, and US President Joe Biden has continued to provide staunch support to the illegal entity amid the Gaza war. On Wednesday, Biden signed into law a massive funding package that will provide an additional $17 billion to the occupying regime.
Massive faculty walkout at @Columbia opposing the university’s decision to call in NYPD on Palestine solidarity protests: pic.twitter.com/DcCSxObtx9
— Bassam Khawaja (@Bassam_Khawaja) April 22, 2024
Washington has also vetoed several United Nations Security Council resolutions calling for a ceasefire in the brutal military aggression.