Organizers of the anti-Israel camp at Columbia University are refusing to consider removing their tents until the administration makes progress on some of their demands.
Mahmoud Khalil, an apartheid divest negotiator at Columbia University, told the Post on Friday afternoon that “we’re not really negotiating the status of the encampments at this point.”
Friday marked the 10th day of the encampment, following an extension from late Wednesday night that appears to have rescinded a request from university leaders for students to clear campus lawns by that morning. .
Khalil told The Post on Friday that students were not given a new time limit to get off the lawn.
“We asked them not to talk about the encampment. We are not a camp, we are there to negotiate demands, and we made that clear.” Khalil spoke to the Post about ongoing negotiations between student organizers and officials.
“The university understood that we cannot operate based on timelines. We cannot operate under time pressure,” he explained.
“We want to negotiate at a time when both sides can meaningfully participate in the conversation, rather than a 12 a.m. deadline during an 8 p.m. meeting.”
Apartheid divestment at Columbia University Five key demands listed on the websiteThese include calling on schools to financially divest from “companies and organizations that profit from Israeli apartheid, genocide, and occupation.”
The list also calls for the university to sever ties with Israeli universities and stop expanding into Harlem, the Lenape ancestral lands, and Palestine.
The final two demands call for the defunding of campus public safety and the severing of the university’s relationship with the New York City Police Department, as well as a public statement “calling for an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza.”
“We have been in negotiations with the university ever since. [last] “On Friday, there is an increasing unwillingness to understand what the core demands of the student movement are,” Sueda Porat, another member of the negotiating team, told the Post.
“Again, at the heart of this action, and at the heart of this camp, is a desire for a complete divestment and boycott of the institutions that are complicit in Israel’s genocide,” she added.
On April 18, Columbia President Minoush Shafiq called on the New York Police Department to enter the Morningside Heights campus and dismantle its original position after protesters ignored warnings to move. .
Authorities arrested 108 protesters at the scene, and similar encampments have since spread to university campuses across the country.
“This university only proposes further engagement with the apartheid state,” Prof Porat said on Friday, referring to Israel.
“For example, we are calling for an end to the dual degree program with Tel Aviv University (which is in direct contradiction to the university’s equal opportunity and affirmative action policies), but the university has “We’re proposing increased access for Palestinians in an apartheid state,” she told the Post.
“On the issue of divestment, which is also a priority demand, Columbia University has advised students that if we end the camp, there is no guarantee that a binding decision on divestment will be guaranteed and that there will be no bureaucratic “We are asking them to operate within the confines of administrative procedures,” she continued.
“The university is refusing to allow students to remain on this turf, ignoring the reality that in the last 10 days we have proven how dedicated we are, how determined we are, how much we really want. They don’t seem to believe that they can maintain their resolve to “completely divest and boycott.”
“They believe they can outdo us. We told them they can’t do it.”
Since the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attack and Israel’s retaliatory bombing of the Gaza Strip, Columbia University and other campuses have become increasingly divided.
In November, Columbia suspended Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace.
Both groups appeared to be celebrating or excusing the deadly Oct. 7 attack and were criticized for promoting ideological rhetoric in their criticism of Israel.
In the 10 days since the tent encampment was set up, Jewish students at Columbia University have felt increasingly unsafe due to demonstrators calling for the destruction of Israel and even expressing support for Hamas. It is reported that there are.
Residents have devoured fruit, nuts, granola bars and expensive sandwiches this week, while also receiving daily necessities such as toothpaste, trash bags and feminine hygiene products delivered to them.
Photos taken by the Post Friday showed the once majestic campus resembling an overcrowded hawker scene.
Earlier this week, the university announced that the final weeks of spring classes would be hybrid due to conflict on campus.
After nearly two weeks of turmoil, others in the community say they’re starting to have enough.
“My friends, we definitely got through the protests in that we wanted to live our lives,” Noah Fay, 23, a Barnard College senior, told the Post on Thursday. Ta.
“They’re selfish. They don’t consider other students,” another student said of the protesters.
