Columbia Responds to Plans for New Anti-Israel Encampment, Student Protesters Don’t Show Up

Columbia Responds to Plans for New Anti-Israel Encampment, Student Protesters Don’t Show Up

As we mentioned in a Quick Take earlier this week, activists at Columbia University were planning to set up a new anti-Israel encampment, despite everything that the school has now been through with the Trump administration.

Columbia officials must have caught wind of the plans because the school posted a warning regarding public safety:

Important Message Regarding Campus Policies on Encampments

We have been made aware of possible plans to establish encampments on Columbia’s campuses. We want to clearly communicate that camping and encampments on Columbia’s campuses are prohibited by University Policy. Our University Rules and Policies prioritize academic activities and communal use of campus space. A more detailed explanation of how an encampment as a form of protest runs the risk of serious violations under the Rules of University Conduct can be found here.

University Response to Encampments

If encampments or tents are established on University property, Public Safety will take the following actions:

• Public Safety will immediately take steps to remove tents or other structures and remove them from the area;

• Access to affected areas will be restricted, and the University may implement additional restrictions to campus access;

• Participants will be instructed to disperse. Individuals who refuse to disperse will be identified and sanctions, including potential removal from campus and possible arrest, may be applied.

For this and whatever other reasons, the protesters failed to show up.

This NBC News report suggests it may have had something to do with the nice weather:

Columbia protesters are a no-show after plans for new encampments were revealed

Protesters did not set up new tent encampments or demonstrate against the war in Gaza at Columbia University on Thursday as planned.

NBC News reported Wednesday that a group planned to set up tent encampments on the New York City school’s main campus Thursday afternoon.

The encampments would have been likely to inflame tension at the Ivy League school, which for weeks has been at the center of a tug-of-war between the federal government and its students.

They would have been the first tent cities at the university since students took over a building last year and since the Trump administration embraced an aggressive approach to target what it describes as a failure to deal with antisemitism on college campuses.

More than 100 protesters met Tuesday at a community center in Brooklyn’s Bushwick neighborhood to coordinate tent encampments at Columbia for this week. Organizers, whose identities remain unknown, went to extreme lengths to conceal their plans…

Instead of protests Thursday, the scene on campus included students enjoying one of the first warm days in New York City this spring. Dozens of students lay out beach towels, snapped selfies under the sun and tossed around Frisbees.

This is probably not over. Does anyone really think the student activists were scared away by the school’s warnings?

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