USA, protests in universities against the war in Gaza.

Translated by Giulia Maffeis

The major American universities have been shaken following the recent events of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The atmosphere is charged after leaders of prestigious institutions such as New York University, Yale, and Columbia University called for law enforcement intervention to remove protest camps on campuses. These operations have led to the arrest of numerous pro-Palestinian demonstrators, fueling controversy and exacerbating divisions within the university community.

In the United States, thousands of students at top universities have organised numerous protest demonstrations from Massachusetts to California. They demand the cessation of academic institutions' commercial ties with arms manufacturers, refusal of research funding from Israel, and disinvestment from companies supporting the war in Gaza. These widespread student protests haven't occurred since the presidency of Richard Nixon and the demonstrations against the Vietnam War in the 1960s.

In American universities, both public and private, protests began after Hamas' attack in Israel on October 7th. Subsequently, various student groups organized both solidarity demonstrations for Israeli and foreign victims of the attack, and protests against Israel's policies, especially due to the intense bombardment of Gaza. The growing tensions among groups, often opposed within the same campus, have led to incidents of intolerance and threats, partly attributable to the administrations' lack of ability to manage such tensions.

The epicentre of the protests seems to be Columbia University, where President Nemat Shafik was the first to request police intervention on campus. A few miles north, Yale University in Connecticut is involved in the same storm: 60 people, including 47 students, have been arrested.

Meanwhile, in the United States, the University of Southern California (USC) in Los Angeles has decided to cancel the graduation ceremony scheduled for May 10th for security reasons, following protests that have occurred on numerous campuses related to the war between Israel and Gaza. In a statement, USC explained that it will not be possible to hold the ceremony on the main stage, which traditionally accommodates 65,000 students, families, and friends, within its campus

After a succession of protests in the United States, students in France have also expressed their opposition to the ongoing war in Gaza. A group of students, composed of several dozen people, occupied a building in the Sciences Po complex in Paris.

Also in Australia, protests against the war in Gaza have gained traction, with students erecting tents at the University of Sydney and chanting slogans similar to those heard in the United States, as well as promoting calls for disinvestment from companies with ties to Israel.

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