Iran Press/ Europe: Police in Amsterdam have intervened to disperse a pro-Palestinian protest after demonstrators took over university buildings.Video footage from the Dutch capital showed officers in riot gear facing off against protesters, some of whom were seen making peace signs while others held signs. Students were heard chanting "we are peaceful, what are you?" and "shame on you" in media coverage.
Earlier, a protest group announced that they had occupied university buildings in Amsterdam, Groningen, and Eindhoven. Meanwhile, students at the University of Ljubljana have taken over the main lecture hall at the Faculty of Social Sciences (FDV) to protest Israeli military actions against Hamas militants in Gaza. They are calling on FDV and the university, Slovenia's primary educational institution, to condemn the Gaza strikes as genocide and support Palestinian rights. The protest has garnered support from six FDV departments, as well as the student council and seven departments from other universities.
Approximately 100 individuals have gathered at a pro-Palestine encampment established over the weekend at University College Dublin (UCD). Since Saturday, students have erected tents and banners around the lake at UCD's Belfield campus in solidarity with Palestinians facing displacement from their homes in Gaza. The encampment is organized by a Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) group formed by UCD students last fall, claiming to have 200-250 members.
What started as a peaceful walkout this morning by hundreds of university staff, professors, and lecturers in protest against police violence against students last week is now developing and escalating once again.
The riot police are here, hundreds of them are blocking the entrance to the university. After the university staff finished their rally, the students went in and built some tents in the main hall.The police are now coming in and [the students] are trying to block the police. They managed for a few minutes but now the police car van is driving towards the entrance and everyone here is very much hoping that the same scenario that happened last week is not repeated here.The protests are against the war in Gaza and they’re also demanding the university to cut ties with Israeli universities but also to protest against police violence and what they say is a violation of their rights to demonstrate.So far I’ve only seen peaceful protesters and the police coming in and of course, there’s a lot of trauma after what happened last week so the situation is quite agitated.
The spread of protests against policies that have generated the current humanitarian catastrophe in the Gaza Strip has been remarkable. Initially centered at Columbia University in New York, the protest movement quickly lit up other college campuses in the United States and has now inspired similar actions around the world. The protests constitute one of the largest and most salient open expressions of opposition to Israel’s subjugation of the Palestinians and to U.S. policies that, for many years under administrations of both parties, have, in effect, condoned Israeli actions. As such, the protests raise hopes of moving the needle of politics and diplomacy on this subject and maybe, just maybe, generating real action toward resolving the destructive Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
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Students at British universities hold Pro-Palestinian gatherings, encampments
