• Dozens of pro-Palestine protesters occupied Columbia University’s Hamilton Hall in Manhattan early Tuesday, barricading entrances and unfurling a banner reading “Hind’s Hall.” Columbia has stated that the students occupying the building face expulsion. CNN (a) (LR: 2 CP: 5)
  • This comes as the school Monday gave an ultimatum for students to end the protest camp or be suspended after talks between protesters and the university stalled over demands for divestment from Israel. Reuters.com (LR: 3 CP: 5)
  • The lead student negotiator for the main encampment has now been suspended and the campus is indefinitely closed to non-residents. Portland State University also locked down its campus after students took over its library. New York Times (LR: 2 CP: 5)
  • While protesters at Brown University, Johns Hopkins University, and Yale have agreed to dismantle encampments, dozens were arrested at the University of North Carolina and California State Polytechnic Humboldt on Tuesday morning. CNN (b) (LR: 2 CP: 5)
  • On Monday, arrests were reported in several colleges — including Princeton, UT-Austin, University of Florida, Virginia Commonwealth University, and Virginia Tech — and Canada’s McGill University requested police assistance. CNN (b) (LR: 2 CP: 5)
  • Protests over the Israel-Hamas war have spread across US college campuses — spreading even to Europe — after some 100 pro-Palestine demonstrators at Columbia University were detained on April 18. Nationwide arrests are currently around 1K. CBS (LR: 2 CP: 5)

Pro-establishment narrative:

  • These students are acting in bad faith to destroy American institutions and are not simply peaceful protesters. Instead of just exercising their First Amendment right to speak, they’ve chosen to create an unsafe space for Jewish students. These institutions have every right to use law enforcement actions according to their procedures to ensure there’s a safe environment for all students and campus operations.
    FOX NEWS (LR: 4 CP: 4)

Establishment-critical narrative:

  • Anywhere there are threats or violence is an outlier, as there are more peaceful protests occurring across the country at all types of schools. These demonstrations will inevitably fade into memory, but this generation of students won’t forget their cause. The future leaders of America clearly oppose Israel’s actions in Gaza. These demonstrations are a nod to the historic civil rights movements of the 1960s.
    HUFFINGTON POST (LR: 1 CP: 4)