Protests at Universities across the fruited plain

[Dave from down under]

He’s very good at providing illumination by conflagration of hydrocarbons in a gaseous state.

Also knowing the hearts and minds of every protestor.

Amazing!!!!

[W. Kevin Vicklund]

The problem with anders assertion about the protestors is that he assumes that everyone knows and agrees with his definition of Zionism. While it once may have had that sole meaning (a Jewish state in the location of historical Palestine), it no longer does. The meaning has evolved since 1948, and to many (most?) people, Zionism now refers to controlling and occupying the remaining Palestinian territories (Gaza, the West Bank, and so on). I personally wasn't even aware of the original meaning of Zionism until the John Marshall piece was posted, and I'm sure that there is a large chunk of the population that have the same understanding I did. Anders and Marshall can certainly campaign to restore the original meaning of Zionism, but they are simply wrong to insist that the protestors must want the complete dismantling of Israel based on a narrow understanding of a single term.

That is not to say that all the protestors are "Pro-Israel, Pro-Palestine, etc." - some are manifestly not.

[Suranis]

Well, when this all kicked off I was in a discord channel with someone who loudly declared he was not going to believe a word the IDF said, no matter what the evidence, because they are liars. Fair enough you might say, but then we rapidly found that he physically could not say that Hamas were liars. The most he would go is "Both sides are liars." And yet He would uncritically accept every Hamas claim.

He reacted very badly when I showed him an Amnesty International report that a hospital not only had a Hamas headquarters in the basement but they had torture chambers there, and they weren't torturing Israelis.

So, ya, I can very well see that these students, at least the ones being very loud and obnoxious, are not exactly balanced when it comes to Israel.

And ya, Netinyahu and Hamas have been using one another for decades.

[raison de arizona]

Stormtrooper.

I’m Dartmouth faculty. I don’t like our new mascot.

[raison de arizona]

I’m a UCLA professor. Why didn’t the administration stop last night’s egregious violence?
The university should have anticipated Tuesday night’s chaos — but security personnel were nowhere to be found

UCLA, the top-rated public university in the United States, experienced one of the darkest nights in its 105-year history on Tuesday. Over the course of my 33-year career at UCLA, I have never seen anything so terrifying take place.

Around 11 p.m., a group of masked counter-demonstrators made their way to the Royce Quad in the heart of campus and began to attack the encampment set up last week by demonstrators opposing the war in Gaza. They threw a firecracker into the encampment, tore down its outer walls, threw heavy objects at demonstrators and instigated direct physical confrontations. Those in the encampment were left to fend for themselves against a violent band of thugs intent on inflicting damage.

The incident marked a total systems failure by the university, the city of Los Angeles and the state of California.

For three hours, the counter-demonstrators attacked the encampment with impunity. UCLA has its own trained police force, and the UCLA administrators with whom I spoke told me that the Los Angeles Police Department had been called to campus. But, somehow, there was no police presence whatsoever until the early hours of the morning.

What makes last night all the more inexplicable was that the university had, over the weekend, seen a haunting warning of what could happen.

https://forward.com/opinion/608479/ucla ... -protests/

[raison de arizona]

BREAKING: This brilliant speech yesterday by a Columbia professor on the cowardice of the university administration in calling in police to arrest students will be cited throughout history -– and will inspire generations of students for decades to come.

Columbia still on lockdown two days later.

[raison de arizona]

UCLA.

Police fire multiple impact munitions at protestors. 4:38am

Police aim impact munitions at woman at point blank range 4:43am

[raison de arizona]

Some of us have been out of school for a while and may have forgotten our American history.

Protesting injustice and expressing our opinions is part of our American tradition and what makes this, in fact, a free country. That’s what the Constitution is all about.

[bill_g]

PSU (Portland State Univ) in downtown Portland presently has its own student occupation going on. Our PNW meetup was just four blocks down the street from the campus a couple weeks ago (Sat Apr 20th). The news announced a bit ago that police and sheriff will begin clearing the campus today continuing through the weekend, and that all the streets in the area will be closed to vehicular and pedestrian traffic.

Sounds like we timed our dinner perfectly.

[raison de arizona]

Those darned meddling kids.

Reporter: Have the protests forced you to reconsider any of the policies with regard to the region?

Biden: No

Apparently Biden is not swayed by the mass killing of children, international law, or an election as a growing number of Americans are appalled by his policies.

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He might want to be reminded of what MLK had to say about civil disobedience:

“Noncooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as is cooperation with good… In our own history, there’s nothing that expresses massive civil disobedience more than the Boston Tea Party”

Biden has the audacity to give that speech that protest shouldn’t lead to disorder — while planning to speak at Morehouse’s commencement— Martin Luther King Jr’s alma mater.

MLK spoke about white moderates more devoted to order than to justice.

[raison de arizona]

https://x.com/RepAnaliseOrtiz/status/17 ... 7559371806

We are calling on Arizona University Presidents and the Board of Regents to reconsider the overly harsh academic consequences that have been brought down on student protestors and allies which undermine the principles of academic freedom and free speech.

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[raison de arizona]

THIS IS NOT AN SNL SKIT…

Rep Tom Cotton: “I’m here to discuss the Little Gazas that has risen up on campuses across the country.”

Source: PBS News Hour

[raison de arizona]

Just thinking about which acts of civil disobedience in this country are met with violent repression

https://www.oregonlive.com/pacific-nort ... ndoff.html

[raison de arizona]

NYCLU on Violent Crackdown of Pro-Palestine Protest at Columbia and City College

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[bill_g]

If only the students had occupied while toting rifles and sidearms expressing their 2A rights as well as their 1A.
.

unhappy men.jpg (90.84 KiB) Viewed 555 times

[raison de arizona]

Can we concede that perhaps campus protests are less threatening to Jewish students than <-checks notes-> the holocaust?

Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY) says Jewish students "are hearing the kind of threats that their great-grandparents heard in Nazi Germany." He says Biden is refusing to save the students from "terrorists" chasing them out of classrooms

This is all just one giant fabrication. It's nuts

[raison de arizona]

Perhaps it really is outside agitators causing the violence...
https://x.com/samswey/status/1786054249090040094

Fewer than half of all NYPD officers live in NYC and only 25% of LAPD officers live in LA. But keep talking about “outside agitators” coming onto campus to do violence.

[raison de arizona]

Here is some hope at a time of division. This conversation with Jewish and Arab students at @UWMadison left me inspired. We need to have nuanced and honest conversations like this in every community and college across the country.

[raison de arizona]

Ole Miss Free Palestine rally co-opted by (reportedly) frat boy Trumpers.

There will be pro-Palestine protests today on Ole Miss’ campus calling on the university to boycott Israel. Organizers are using the same language from other campus protests. Will be interesting to see how many people show & if more frat bros answer the call.

Can’t even see the protest it was so deep

[raison de arizona]

SIUE faculty.
https://x.com/SandraTamari1/status/1786101049725448655

My husband, Prof. Steve Tamari, is out of the hospital. He will need surgery on his hand, and he is in pain from nine broken ribs. We are asking for time to rest and heal. We will not be taking media interviews at this time. Here is Steve's statement and ways you can support.

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[raison de arizona]

https://x.com/OrganizerMemes/status/1786089369398591595

An email from a UCLA professor

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[raison de arizona]

#BREAKING Students at RUTGERS came to an agreement with the University to put down the tents of the encampment and university began a dialog with them about their demands.

[raison de arizona]

Claims That Student Protestors Are Chanting 'Death to America' Are Bullshit
But Washington is falling for the hoax, urging an FBI crackdown

The FBI is being pressed by members of Congress to investigate the student protests, both for possible foreign financing and for students chanting "Death to America" — a phrase Fox News says is becoming a "key slogan" of the protests.

There's just one problem: students never said it.

I’ve searched, scoured photographs, and waded through social media. There’s no evidence that any of the student demonstrators taking to dozens of college campuses in recent weeks to protest Israel’s war in Gaza said “Death to America.”

The rumor began with a single incident in which an anonymously authored pamphlet found at a University of Michigan encampment contained a passage saying, “Freedom for Palestine means Death to America.”

That phrase was taken up by Fox News and a number of other news sites.

“The slogan ‘Death to America’ is seemingly gaining steam among anti-Israel agitators, who have swept across the nation,” Fox News reported.

The claims of a Death to America theme have germinated in right-wing media outlets and even been echoed by more mainstream figures from smug commentator Bill Maher to the Atlantic Magazine, which warned that “every random protester who shouts ‘Death to America’...brings him [Donald Trump] closer to a return to the Oval Office.” Harvard President Emeritus Larry Summers has even called for “close investigations” of the funding sources of the recent protests on college campuses.

Though absent on campus, the one place the Death to America slogan is gaining steam is in Washington, where the hoax has been taken at face value.

https://www.kenklippenstein.com/p/claim ... estors-are

[raison de arizona]

Philadelphia Police Department declines to disband encampment after Penn requests immediate help

Penn asked the Philadelphia Police Department for immediate help to disband the Gaza Solidarity Encampment, a source familiar told The Daily Pennsylvanian.

However, PPD declined, asking that the University provide proof that the encampment — and the rally today, which is entering its fourth hour — presents an imminent danger. News of the request for help came as Penn Public Safety issued its fourth UPenn Alert — the first alerts since the encampment started eight days ago.

https://www.thedp.com/article/2024/05/p ... uests-help

[raison de arizona]

At the rate they are banning teachers, some of these universities won't have any Jewish studies left.
https://x.com/AlanRMacLeod/status/1786128312609157497

Breaking: Annelise Orleck, Head of Jewish Studies at Dartmouth, has been banned from Campus for six months after protecting Jewish students protesting for Palestine from police attacks

https://www.jta.org/2024/05/02/united-s ... 7-response

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@dartmouth calls in riot cops to forcibly arrest my colleague and friend @AnneliseOrleck1, knocking her to ground

Police officers arresting an elderly demonstrator @WMUR9

Those cops were brutal to me. I promise I did absolutely nothing wrong. I was standing with a line of women faculty in the their 60s to 80s trying to protect our students. I have now been banned from the campus where I have taught for 34 years.