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Rutgers students — reluctantly — end Gaza solidarity encampment
Protesters wanted Rutgers to divest from Israel. Administrators agreed to some of their demands — but not that.
Hundreds of Rutgers University students held a four-day Gaza solidarity encampment on the New Brunswick campus, dismantling the camp Thursday, May 2, 2024, after they said university administrators conceded to some of their 10 demands. (Dana DiFilippo | New Jersey Monitor)
Rutgers University students peacefully dismantled their pro-Palestine encampment on the New Brunswick campus Thursday evening after university administrators agreed to some of their demands.
Dozens of tents first erected Monday came down shortly after 4 p.m. Thursday — the deadline Rutgers President Jonathan Holloway set earlier in the day for students to end their encampment on Voorhees Mall’s lawn near Scott Hall or face possible arrest.
Rutgers New Brunswick Chancellor Francine Conway said the resolution was “achieved through constructive dialogue” between protesting students and administrators. The agreement “opens the door for ongoing dialogue and better addresses the needs” of the 7,000 Arab, Muslim, and Palestinian students who attend Rutgers.
Protestors made a list of 10 demands for the university, listing their two top priorities as getting Rutgers to divest its financial holdings from companies with ties to Israel or benefitting from the war, and to sever its partnership with Tel Aviv University.
Organizers said administrators granted all their demands except those two, which Conway said “fall outside of our administrative scope.” The divestment request is under review, she added.
The university also did not explicitly call for a ceasefire, as students demanded.
Conway agreed in a three-page response to the protestors that the university would grant some of their demands, including welcoming 10 displaced Palestinian students to finish their education at Rutgers, developing a plan by the fall to create an Arab Cultural Center with a designated physical space and staff, and reviewing Rutgers’ relationship with Birzeit University, a public university in the West Bank.
University officials also will convene a working group to identify gaps in faculty and conduct a study on the creation of a Department of Middle East Studies.
“Our commitment to our students is paramount. I am grateful for our faculty’s role in guiding and supporting the students toward this peaceful resolution. At Rutgers-New Brunswick, we are dedicated to fostering a community prioritizing safe and peaceful resolution through open dialogue,” she said in a message to the university.
A mixed reaction
Cheers erupted on the tent-strewn campus lawn after students learned many of their demands had been granted, and some quickly began tearing down tents and tables and gathering protest signs. A few dozen students, though, angrily continued to chant slogans like “There is only one solution! Intifada revolution!” and refused to leave for an hour.
Campus police sent an alert just before 6 p.m. ordering everyone to clear the Voorhees Mall area due to police activity. By 7 p.m., the encampment was fully cleared.
Students declined to talk with the New Jersey Monitor, citing concerns about university discipline and attacks or doxxing by Israel supporters.
Dozens of faculty joined the encampment and helped form a human chain between the pro-Palestinian students and a smaller group of Israel supporters who waved Israeli and American flags. Police stood guard all around the green.
Todd Wolfson is a media studies professor president of Rutgers AAUP-AFT, which represents 5,000 full-time faculty, graduate workers, counselors, and librarians.
He said the university’s unions support the students’ calls for the ceasefire although not necessarily all their demands. Still, he said, faculty were prepared to “put our bodies on the line” and get arrested to protect students’ right to protest.
“We think our students must have the right to speak, and across this country, we have seen awful repression of students,” Wolfson said. “We will stand with the students to force the administration to stand by the commitments they made to the students.”
He pushed back on reports that there was antisemitic behavior and outside agitators at the encampment. Holloway earlier Thursday said some protestors are individuals “not from our community.”
“Antisemitism’s been weaponized — weaponized! — to stop people from fighting to stop an unjust war,” said Wolfson, adding that he’s Jewish.
Ronald Chavez Hassan, a teacher, lecturer and mental health specialist at Rutgers University Behavioral Health, has dropped by the encampment throughout its four days.
“I like the fact that you have such a diverse group of people, regardless of religion or race, ethnicity, coming together to stand up for what’s right, for freedom and human rights and the protection of the innocents. Doing this is a microcosm of we should be doing all around the world, whether Ukraine, or Rohingya, or the Uyghurs in the Xinjiang province. We have to take a stand,” Hassan said. “Rutgers is the flagship university of New Jersey, and we should be representing and trying to encourage people to look at the truth.”
Rutgers University professors Todd Wolfson, president of the Rutgers AAUP-AFT, and Howie Swerdloff, secretary of the adjunct union of Rutgers-AAUP, celebrate the end of students' Gaza solidarity encampment. The students agreed to end their action after they said university administrators conceded to eight of their 10 demands. (Dana DiFilippo | New Jersey Monitor)
A Rutgers University police officer stands guard over the Gaza solidarity encampment students erected on the New Brunswick campus. Students dismantled the camp Thursday, May 2, 2024, after they said university administrators conceded to eight of their 10 demands. (Dana DiFilippo | New Jersey Monitor)
In his message to the university earlier Thursday, Holloway said the encampment’s early morning protests forced Rutgers to make the “unprecedented decision to postpone morning exams on the College Avenue Campus.”
“We value free speech and the right to protest, but it should not come at the cost of our students’ education and safety. We strive to balance these rights and maintain a safe and secure environment for our students to learn and succeed,” he said in the email.
The postponements affected 28 final exams scheduled for Thursday morning, impacting 1,000 students, Rutgers officials said.
The governor’s office declined to comment.
The New Brunswick encampment was at least the third in New Jersey, after students at Princeton University established a camp there last week. An encampment at Rutgers’ Newark campus remains ongoing.
Students across the country have set up such solidarity encampments and taken over campus buildings to push universities to divest from companies with ties to Israel. Some have turned tense, with more than 2,000 protestors arrested around the country.
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