A woman was taken away on a stretcher during as some 200 anti-Israel protesters continued demonstrations at Columbia University on Saturday, photos show.
Columbia University EMS responded to a call from the grass field on campus and provided medical treatment to a student, a university spokesperson told The Post. It was not clear what the student’s condition was.
Several student protesters held up black umbrellas and tarpaulin to block her from sight.
Two days after more than 100 students were arrested when the NYPD raided the tent encampment on the Ivy League campus, roughly 200 demonstrators were still going strong on Saturday, chanting, holding signs and waving Palestinian flags.
At least three people were arrested, the NYPD confirmed. Two were cuffed for disorderly conduct and a third was slapped with a summonses for a sound reproduction device.
“Up, up with liberation. Down, down with occupation,” they yelled through the locked campus gate on W. 115th and Broadway.
“We want justice, you say how? Stop arming Israel now!” another group chanted.
The students are demanding the university divest from Israel.
“We demand that Columbia sever academic ties with Israeli universities and we demand that Columbia stop censoring and intimidating students who are standing up and advocating for Palestinian liberation,” one student yelled through the gate to the crowd that had gathered on the other side outside of campus.
A line of police officers in riot helmets watched on. A handful of Israel supporters stood across Broadway — including one who was doused with fake blood for engaging with the pro-Palestinian students.
Avi Lichtschein, 37, of Manhattan was walking his dog when the group surrounded him and shouted, “We don’t want no Zionists here!”
Follow The Post’s coverage of the pro-terror protests at colleges across the US:
- Tear gas sprayed at UCLA encampment as cops face off with anti-Israel protesters wielding fire extinguishers
- Stanford submits ‘deeply disturbing’ photo of campus anti-Israel protester wearing Hamas headband to FBI
- Iranian college offers free tuition to US students expelled for participating in anti-Israel protests: ‘Our people’
- MAP: US colleges where students have been arrested over anti-Israel protests
He looked toward the NYPD for help after being sprayed with what he said was ketchup, but remained on the street for another minute to talk with the protesters until they finally chased him away.
“I’m a proud Zionist,” Lichtschein told The Post. “I’m very surprised that this kind of hatred exists in any capacity in 2024.”
“It’s difficult for me to understand that there are two sides when on one side it’s gentle and peace. We don’t have these kind of rallies,” he continued.
“I thought college kids are supposed to be going to keggers and having fun. This hate shouldn’t exist in any capacity.”
Antisemitism controversy at Columbia University: Key events
- More than 280 anti-Israel demonstrators were cuffed at Columbia and the City of New York campuses overnight in a “massive” NYPD operation.
- One hundred and nine people were nabbed at the Ivy League campus after cops responded to Columbia’s request to help oust a destructive mob that had illegally taken over the Hamilton Hall academic building late Tuesday, NYC Mayor Eric Adams and police said.
- Hizzoner blamed the on-campus chaos on insurgents who have a “history of escalating situations and trying to create chaos” instead of protesting peacefully.
- Columbia’s embattled president Minouche Shafik, who has faced mounting calls to resign for not cracking down sooner, issued a statement Wednesday saying the on-campus violence had “pushed the university to the brink.”
- Columbia University president Minouche Shafik was accused of “gross negligence” while testifying before Congress. Shafik refused to say if the phrase “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” is antisemitic.
- More than 100 Columbia professors signed a letter defending students who support the “military action” by Hamas.
Another pro-Israel bystander Ross Glick, 50, told The Post his grandparents were Holocaust survivors. The Upper East Side resident grew up in the Midwest during the first intifada but said “this is more concerning.”
“There’s no doubt that there’s a lot of innocent people dying in Gaza but to call it a genocide….What about the 6,000 Muslims that were gassed by Assad?” Glick said.
“If you don’t like it go to Gaza,” he said about the protesters.
The protesters, he said, don’t want a peaceful solution.
“You don’t hear them talk about peace or co-existence. [It’s] death to Israel,” he said.
Nerdeen Kiswani, who leads the condemned Within Our Lifetime group, gave an impassioned speech to the crowd after apparently getting married tonight.
“These universities have come to represent the oppression that they have always fostered. Before they denied this genocide, they gentrified Harlem!” Kiswani shouted.
“They continue to place themselves on the wrong side of history,” she added about Columbia.
New York City council members Shahana Hanif, Alexa Aviles, Sandy Nurse and Tiffany Caban all stopped by earlier in the afternoon to visit the demonstration. The Post has reached out to each of their offices for comment.
Numerous protesters who were not associated with Columbia swarmed campus earlier in the day — including actress Susan Sarandon and a former CUNY professor who once threatened a Post reporter with a machete.
A Columbia spokesperson noted that while the tent encampment has been dismantled, the school anticipates demonstrations to continue as they have since October.
There are rules in place regarding the time, place and manner of protests on campus that it will continue to enforce, the spokesperson said.
Columbia University and Barnard College faculty slammed Thursday’s arrests and demanded that their records be expunged.
The American Association of University Professors at the sister schools issued a statement following a “mass emergency meeting” of faculty on Friday.
“We condemn in the strongest possible terms the Administration’s suspension of students engaged in peaceful protest and their arrest by the New York City Police Department,” according to the statement provided to The Post.
They said Columbia has an “absolute obligation” to protect students’ freedom of speech.
“We demand that all Barnard College and Columbia University suspensions and charges be dismissed immediately and expunged from the students’ records, and that all rights and privileges be restored to them immediately,” the faculty said.
They also demanded that no students face any disciplinary action for protesting without due process and that no police officers be allowed on campus “without serious consultation” with the Executive Committee of the University Senate.
