Protesters gather at the University of California Los Angeles.

Palestinians may be gratified to see American university campuses erupt in outrage over Israel's offensive in Gaza, but some in the embattled enclave are also wondering why no similar protests have hit the Arab countries they long viewed as allies.

Demonstrations have rocked U.S. universities this week, with confrontations between students, counter protesters and police, but while there have been some protests in Arab states, they have not been nearly as large or as vociferous.

"We follow the protests on social media every day with admiration but also with sadness. We are sad that those protests are not happening also in Arab and Muslim countries," said Ahmed Rezik, 44, a father of five sheltering in Rafah in Gaza's south.

"Thank you students in solidarity with Gaza. Your message has reached us. Thank you students of Columbia. Thank you students," was scrawled across a tent in Rafah, where more than a million people are sheltering from Israel's offensive.

Reasons for the comparative quiet on Arab campuses and streets may range from a fear of angering autocratic governments to political differences with Hamas and its Iranian backers or doubts that any protests could impact state policy.

American students at elite universities may face arrest or expulsion from their schools, but harsher consequences could await Arab citizens protesting without state authorisation.

And U.S. students may feel more motivation to protest as their own government backs and arms Israel, while even those Arab countries that have full diplomatic relations with it have been strongly critical of its military campaign.

When asked about the conflict, Arabs from Morocco to Iraq have consistently voiced fury at Israel's actions and solidarity with Gaza's embattled inhabitants, leading to muted Ramadan celebrations across the region last month.

Some rallies to support Palestinians have erupted, notably in Yemen where the Houthis have joined the conflict with strikes on shipping in the Red Sea.

And Arabs around the region have also shown their horror at the war and support for their fellow Arabs in Gaza on social media, even if they have not taken to the streets.

But whatever the reason for the lack of public protests, some people in Gaza are now drawing unfavourable comparisons between the tumult in the United States and the public reaction they can see in other Arab countries.

"I ask Arab students to do what the Americans have done. They should have done more for us than the Americans," said Suha al-Kafarna, displaced by the war from home in northern Gaza.

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PUBLIC OPINION

In Egypt, which made peace with Israel in 1979 and where President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has largely outlawed public protests, the authorities fear that demonstrations against Israel could later turn against the government in Cairo.

At state-sanctioned protests over the war in October, some demonstrators veered off the agreed route and started chanted anti-government slogans, prompting arrests.

"One cannot see the lack of large public protests against the war and the muted reaction on the Egyptian street in isolation from a broader context of crackdown on all forms of public protest and assembly," said Hossam Bahgat, head of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights.

At the American University in Cairo security forces are less likely to intervene on campus and there have been some protests. But a student activist there who requested anonymity said they could still face consequences for demonstrating.

"Being arrested here is nothing like being arrested in the U.S. It's completely different," he said, adding that there was "the factor of fear" preventing many from taking to the streets.

In Lebanon, where success in studies has become even more personally important to many young people after years of political and economic crises that have shrunk their shot at future prosperity, that calculation is even tougher.

Several students Reuters approached at campus protests in Beirut declined to be interviewed, saying they feared repercussions from university authorities.

The complex histories of Lebanon and other Arab states such as Jordan that host many Palestinian refugees also play into the question of public protests.

In Lebanon, some people blame Palestinians for triggering the 1975-90 civil war. Others fear any overt displays of support for Palestinians might be hijacked by the Iran-backed Hezbollah, which has been trading fire with Israel since the start of the Gaza conflict.

"The Arab world is not reacting like Columbia or Brown (U.S. universities) because they don't have the luxury to do so," said Makram Rabah, a history professor at the American University of Beirut.

Besides, he added, with public opinion already largely backing the Palestinian cause it was not clear what protests there would achieve.

"The dynamics of power and the way you change public perception are just different in the Arab world compared to the U.S.," he said.

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What do pro-Palestinian student protesters at US universities want?

Dozens of college campuses across the US have been taken over by students protesting against the war in Gaza.

More than a thousand demonstrators have been arrested, including more than 100 on Tuesday night at Columbia University in New York City.

Many universities are struggling to deal with encampments on college grounds, just days before graduation ceremonies.

Why are students protesting over the war in Gaza?

Since the 7 October attack by Hamas and Israel's retaliatory assault, students have launched rallies, sit-ins, hunger strikes and, most recently, encampments against the war.

They are demanding that their schools, many with massive endowments, financially divest from Israel.

Divestment means to sell off stock in Israeli companies, or to otherwise drop financial ties.

Student activists say that companies doing business in Israel, or with Israeli organisations, are complicit in its ongoing war in Gaza - as are colleges investing in those companies.

University endowments fund everything from research labs to scholarship funds, mostly using returns from millions - and billions - of dollars in investments.

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What happened at Columbia University?

During a police police raid on Tuesday night, officers cleared the encampment and removed protesters from an academic building they had taken over.

Officers in riot gear climbed ladders to enter the second storey of Hamilton Hall, before taking occupants away in police buses.

Some 119 people were arrested at Columbia Tuesday night, John Chell, chief of patrol for the NYPD, said Wednesday. Chell said it remains unclear how many of those individuals were students and how many were "outside agitators".

It began earlier this month. As Columbia president Minouche Shafik testified before Congress about antisemitism on campus, hundreds of students pitched tents on the Upper Manhattan campus.

Mass arrests the following day failed to prevent the protests from continuing and they sparked action at more colleges across the US. In-person classes at Columbia were cancelled.

Talks to resolve the dispute broke down and when the occupation spread to a university building, the police were called in again.

The university said the hall had been vandalised and blockaded and the police would remain until mid-May to prevent further encampments.

Where else are students protesting?

The escalating crisis at Columbia inspired similar protests and encampments across the country, including:

• Northeast region: George Washington; Brown; Yale; Harvard; Emerson; NYU; Georgetown; American; University of Maryland; Johns Hopkins; Tufts; Cornell; University of Pennsylvania; Princeton; Temple; Northeastern; MIT; The New School; University of Rochester; University of Pittsburgh

• West Coast: California State Polytechnic, Humboldt; University of Southern California; University of California, Los Angeles; University of California, Berkeley; University of Washington

• Midwest region: University of Wisconsin; Northwestern; Washington University in St Louis; Indiana University; University of Michigan; Ohio State; University of Minnesota; Miami University; University of Ohio; Columbia College Chicago; University of Chicago

• The South: Tulane; Emory; Vanderbilt; University of North Carolina, Charlotte; University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill; Kennesaw State; Florida State; Virginia Tech; University of Georgia, Athens

• Southwest: University of Texas at Austin; Rice; Arizona State

Pro-Palestinian protesters have also gathered over the past week on university campuses in Australia, Canada, France, Italy and the UK.

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How have universities handled the protests?

Some are negotiating with student activists while others are issuing ultimatums that have led to police being called in.

The latest round of arrests on Wednesday were made in Wisconsin at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, where some 10 people were arrested and in New Orleans, Louisiana, where 14 people were arrested.

But an agreement was reached between Northwestern University and protesters which limits the size of the encampment.

National politicians have called on colleges to do more, highlighting reports of antisemitism at some of these protests.

Jewish students at several campuses have told the BBC about incidents that made them feel uncomfortable or fearful.

These ranged from chants and signs supporting Hamas, a proscribed terror group, to physical altercations and perceived threats.

Has protesting worked?

Pro-Palestinian campus groups have for years called on their institutions to support the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement, as a means of pushing back against Israel.

No US university has ever committed to the BDS framework, although some have cut specific financial ties in the past.

While divestment would have a negligible impact, if any, on the war in Gaza, protesters say it would shed light on those who profit from war and help build awareness of their issue.

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Why are students recalling protests over Vietnam war?

Activists at Columbia and elsewhere have highlighted the protests at the end of the 1960s against US involvement in the Vietnam War.

Thousands were arrested and there were violent clashes with police.

Four students in Ohio were killed in 1970 when the National Guard opened fire.

Their deaths triggered a nationwide student strike and hundreds of universities closed.

At campuses across Maine, students protest, question college investments in Israel defense

Students and community members at the University of Southern Maine in Portland last week held a rally to support Palestinian rights and criticize the support the U.S. has provided Israel in its bombardment of Gaza. (via Maine Students for Palestine)

As protests over Israel’s war in Gaza sweep college campuses around the country, students in Maine are also engaging in demonstrations and actions. 

Protests featuring student encampments have sprung up at institutions ranging from Columbia University in New York City to Washington University in St. Louis, among others, leading to arrests in some cases. The ACLU in a recent open letter to college and university presidents called the arrests “disturbing” and urged institutions of higher learning to “not sacrifice principles of academic freedom and free speech that are core to the educational mission.” 

In Maine, students and community members at the University of Southern Maine in Portland last week held a rally to support Palestinian rights and criticize the support the U.S. has provided Israel in its bombardment of Gaza. Students at the University of Maine at Farmington held a similar demonstration on Monday and Tuesday that featured signs such as “Free Palestine” and “End the Genocide.” 

Furthermore, the Maine Coalition for Palestine, along with students and workers, will rally May 4 at 1 p.m. in Portland’s Deering Oaks Park to “demand an immediate permanent ceasefire in Gaza and the West Bank, an end to Israeli occupation, and no more U.S. military aid to Israel” — another in a series of demonstrations that have taken place in Maine since the war in Gaza began. 

And at Bowdoin College in Brunswick, students are considering a referendum that would call for the institution to take a public stand against Israel’s “ongoing scholasticide in Gaza,” referring to destruction of educational systems in the territory. 

The resolution also would urge Bowdoin to disclose its investment portfolio’s exposure to arms manufacturing, ask the college to commit to not investing in “defense-focused funds” and certain companies whose weapons have been used in the conflict, and call on the Board of Trustees to reinstate an independent committee of campus members to examine the social responsibility of Bowdoin’s investments. 

Voting on the referendum opened Monday and will conclude on May 4, according to Bowdoin Students for Justice In Palestine. 

The actions in Maine and at campuses across the country come as the death toll from Israel’s war in Gaza has risen past 34,000 Palestinians, with over 77,000 people wounded. The assault is in response to an Oct. 7 attack by the Palestinian militant group Hamas that killed over 1,100 people in Israel and resulted in others being taken captive. 

As the number of deaths in Gaza has risen, an expert appointed by the United Nations has accused Israel of committing genocide in the territory. In addition — as seen by the protests at college campuses along with declining approval numbers for President Joe Biden’s handling of the conflict — anger is building over the military support the U.S. has provided for Israel. 

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Despite that, Biden signed a bill last week that provides additional aid to Israel — along with Ukraine and Taiwan — and reiterated that his commitment to America’s alliance with Israel is “ironclad” while also calling for Israel to ensure humanitarian assistance reaches people in Gaza. 

Meanwhile, Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson has announced an expanded investigation into antisemitism at colleges and universities and claimed the campus demonstrations represent a threat to Jewish students. But other political leaders, such as Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, have argued that opposing Israel’s war in Gaza should not be conflated with antisemitism. 

Students start wave of protests over Gaza at UK universities after US crackdown

Students joined pro-Palestine protests and encampments at universities in the UK on Wednesday following violent demonstrations at campuses in the US.

Demonstrations took place at several universities including Sheffield, Bristol, Leeds and Newcastle, and others were expected to join them.

The protests came following violent clashes on the University of California campus between pro-Palestinian protesters and a group of counter-demonstrators, hours after police stormed Columbia University and arrested dozens of students.

At Goldsmiths University in south London, students have been occupying buildings - including the library - for weeks.

On Tuesday, video shared online showed students holding a rally in a courtyard at the university and chanting “no justice, no peace, if you don’t give us justice then you don’t get no peace”.

Students also occupied the library and demanded to meet with senior management to discuss their protests and the war in Gaza.

“I think a lot of people are really inspired by what’s going on in the US,” Samira, a 24-year-old sociology student and member of Goldsmiths For Palestine, told The Independent.

 

“We feel a duty as students to come out and protest when you’re seeing like, fellow students in the US…smashed up by riots, and all of that, but, yeah…I think people are really inspired.”

Students at the University of Bristol, University of Leeds, and Newcastle University set up tents in demonstrations on Wednesday.

Bristol students said they staged the action “in protest of the university’s complicity in Israel’s genocide of Palestinians,” while Apartheid Off Campus Newcastle said its demonstration was to “highlight the institution’s investment strategy and its complicity in the Israeli military’s war crimes in Gaza and the West Bank.”

In the US, police arrested some 35 people at California State Polytechnic University, Humbold yesterday after pro-Palestinian protesters barricaded themselves inside the dean’s office.

The students had been occupying Siemens Hall since 22 April.

Overnight, hundreds of police officers dressed in riot gear stormed Columbia, where campus protesters had occupied Hamilton Hall since Monday.

They later used a SWAT ramp, attached to the roof of a truck, to enter the barricaded building and 109 people were arrested.

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A further 173 arrests were made at the City College of New York, wher demonstrations have also taken place.

How cities across the U.S. are responding to campus protests

Demonstrators clash at a pro-Palestinian encampment at UCLA early Wednesday, May 1, 2024, in Los Angeles. Dueling groups of protesters have clashed at the University of California, Los Angeles, grappling in fistfights and shoving, kicking and using sticks to beat one another.

Police forces are assisting campus public safety officials on campuses across the United States in response to pro-Palestine protests. From New York to Los Angeles, universities have relied on cities to provide police support in attempts to clear encampments set up on campuses in protest of Israel’s actions against Gaza and in support of Palestinians.

More than 1,000 protesters have been arrested in the last two weeks at universities, including Columbia University and City College of New York, the University of Texas, the University of North Carolina, California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt State University and more, The Associated Press reported. Twenty people were arrested this week during protests at the University of Utah.

Violence between police and protesters escalated Tuesday night, with police using “chemical munition weapons” on demonstrators at the University of Arizona, according to the Arizona Daily Star.

Meanwhile, Brown University chose not to ask the city of Providence, Rhode Island, for help from police. The university reached an agreement with pro-Palestine protesters to have the Brown Corporation vote on a divestment measure later this year in exchange for protesters to leave the encampment Tuesday, The Providence Journal reported.

New York

The New York City Police Department stormed a building on Columbia’s campus that was occupied by protesters Tuesday night. The NYPD said it arrested 282 people — 109 at Columbia and 173 at City College of New York.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams has come out strongly against protests on campus.

“They are attempting to disrupt our city, and we are not going to permit it to happen,” Adams said at a news conference Wednesday morning, according to ABC 7 New York. “And we’re proud to say they have been removed from the campus. The NYPD is precision policing ensured that the operation was organized, calm, and that there were no injuries or violent clashes.”

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said Tuesday that the state had offered universities “support efforts as needed.”

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Los Angeles

After reports of violence at UCLA’s campus late Tuesday and early Wednesday, the school was slow to call for help from law enforcement, protesters claim.

Violence broke out at a pro-Palestine encampment on UCLA’s campus before midnight Tuesday when a group of counter demonstrators “arrived on campus and tried to tear down the barricades surrounding the encampment,” leading to campers rallying to “defend the encampment’s perimeter,” the Los Angeles Times reported.

Nearly two hours after the initial clash, police officers arrived in riot gear. According to The Associated Press, “the university said it requested help” from the city. However, police did not break up clashes until around 3 a.m., according to a timeline by the LA Times.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass posted on X that the police had arrived on campus, saying “the violence unfolding this evening at UCLA is absolutely abhorrent and inexcusable.”

The editorial board of UCLA’s student newspaper, The Daily Bruin, accused the school of being “complicit in violence inflicted upon protesters” and failing to protect students by allowing the violence to continue before calling the police.

“For hours, UCLA administration stood by and watched as the violence escalated.” The editorial reads, “... Daily Bruin reporters on the scene were slapped and indirectly sprayed with irritants.”

Civil rights groups speak out

The director of the Los Angeles chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations condemned the violence in a statement, saying, “Last night’s attack on UCLA students supporting Palestine was only the latest incident of violence against them. In recent days, pro-Israel extremists directed racial slurs and sexual threats at students, spat on a student and released a pack of mice into the encampment.”

Meanwhile, the Jewish Federation Los Angeles stated, “The abhorrent actions of a few counterprotesters last night do not represent the Jewish community or our values.”

Gov. Newsom responds to violence on UCLA campus

California Gov. Gavin Newsom responded early afternoon Wednesday in a statement:

“I condemn the violence at UCLA last night. The law is clear: The right to free speech does not extend to inciting violence vandalism, or lawlessness on campus. Those who engage in illegal behavior must be held accountable for their actions — including through criminal prosecution, suspension, or expulsion.”

Newsom’s spokesperson, Izzy Gardon, said the governor’s office deployed the California Highway Patrol Tuesday night after the “limited and delayed campus law enforcement responses.”

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“The Governor’s Office of Emergency Services has been coordinating law enforcement mutual aid requests statewide, including responding for assistance at UCLA throughout the night and early morning,” a statement from the governor’s office reads. “... We stand ready to provide additional mutual aid to local law enforcement and campuses when requested.”