Columbia University Announces Wave of Restrictions After Protesters Seize Control of Building

Columbia University announced a wave of restrictions on Tuesday for the remainder of the spring semester after anti-Israel protesters seized control of an administrative building on campus.

The Office of the President sent an e-mail informing Columbia University students, faculty, and staff of updates regarding student access to dining halls, transportation services, dormitories, and mail services hours after anti-Israel protesters involved in an encampment at the university took over Hamilton Hall, an administrative building, according to the campus newspaper the Columbia Spectator.

In the early hours of Tuesday morning, anti-Israel protesters seized control of Hamilton Hall. Video footage showed the protesters carrying barricades into the building, smashing the glass doors to the building, and hanging pro-Palestinian banners from the windows of the building.

Demonstrators supporting Palestinians in Gaza barricade themselves inside Hamilton Hall at Columbia University on April 30, 2024, in New York City. (Alex Kent/Getty Images)

Before this e-mail, Columbia University had sent an earlier e-mail revealing that access would be restricted to the campus “until circumstances allow otherwise.”

In a statement released by Columbia University addressing the protestes’ occupation of the building, the university advised: “Members of the University community who can avoid coming to the Morningside campus should do so.”

An initial encampment was started on Columbia University’s campus on April 17. The following day, several students were suspended, and hundreds of protesters involved in the encampment were arrested.

While Columbia University removed the first encampment, another one has sprouted up on the university’s campus.

Several anti-Israel encampments have been established on university and college campuses such as Harvard University, the University of California Los Angeles, George Washington University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Yale University, among others.

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Universities such as Yale University and the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill (UNC Chapel Hill) reportedly cleared out the anti-Israel encampments, and several protesters were reportedly arrested at UNC Chapel Hill.

Northwestern University recently reached an agreement with the anti-Israel protesters. Under the agreement, the encampment established on the university’s campus will be removed, and protests and gatherings will be able to continue on campus until June 1, with only one aid tent remaining.

The university will also “advise employers not to rescind job offers for students engaging in speech protected by the First Amendment,” the agreement says.