US campus protests: calls for Columbia president to face no-confidence vote; Biden condemns ‘violent’ demonstrations – live

The Pulitzer prize board issued a statement recognizing the work of student journalists across the US who are covering pro-Palestine protests on their campuses.

The board specifically recognized the work of student journalists at Columbia University, where the Pulitzer prizes are located, for documenting the events on campus as New York police raided student-led encampments on 30 April.

Here is the board’s full statement:

As we gather to consider the nation’s finest and most courageous journalism, the Pulitzer Prize Board would like to recognize the tireless efforts of student journalists across our nation’s college campuses, who are covering protests and unrest in the face of great personal and academic risk. We would also like to acknowledge the extraordinary real-time reporting of student journalists at Columbia University, where the Pulitzer Prizes are housed, as the New York Police Department was called onto campus on Tuesday night. In the spirit of press freedom, these students worked to document a major national news event under difficult and dangerous circumstances and at risk of arrest.

The Columbia University chapter of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) has called for a vote of no confidence against Columbia president Minouche Shafik.

In a statement, the association criticized the decision by Shafik, the university’s board of trustees, and other Columbia officials to call New York police officers to remove student protests on 30 April.

“These offenses culminated in the horrific police attack on our students that is now shamefully on view for the whole world to see,” the association wrote, adding that students, faculty, and staff remain locked out of campus.

“A vote of no confidence is the only way to begin rebuilding our shattered community and re-establishing the University’s core values of free speech, the right to peaceful assembly, and shared governance.”

The call for a no-confidence vote at Columbia comes days after Barnard president Laura Rosenbury lost a faculty-wide vote of no confidence, the first in the college’s history, the Columbia Daily Spectator reported.

Biden also said that he did not believe that the National Guard should intervene in pro-Palestine protests on college campuses.

A reporter asked Biden: “Mr President, do you think the National Guard should intervene?”

Biden replied: “No.”

This latest stance from Biden comes as Republican lawmakers, including House Speaker Mike Johnson, have called on Biden to allow the National Guard to quell protests on campus.

Several Democrats have dismissed the idea, noting that it would escalate tensions on campuses.

In his remarks, Joe Biden admonished protests on campuses that use “violent” methods, including vandalism, trespassing, and forcing classes to be cancelled.

But Biden added that the right to free speech must be protected in the US.

“Violent protests are not protected. Peaceful protest is,” Biden said as scores of demonstrators were arrested overnight for participating in pro-Palestine protests on college campuses.

During comments on Thursday, Biden said: “There’s the right to protest, but not the right to cause chaos,” Biden said.

“Vandalism, trespassing, breaking windows, shutting down campus, forcing the cancellation of classes and graduation … none of this is a peaceful protest,” Biden said.

Biden added: “We are not an authoritarian nation where we silence people and squash dissent … but neither are we a lawless country.”

US president Joe Biden will momentarily be giving remarks on the pro-Palestine protests occurring nationwide at colleges and universities.

Stay tuned for further updates on his remarks.

Jon Henley

Here is the Guardian’s Jon Henley on pro-Palestine demonstrations at universities in Paris.

Pro-Palestinian students at Sciences Po in Paris have started a new sit-in – and at least one has said they would launch a hunger strike – after the university’s acting director refused demands to review its relations with Israeli universities, links through joint research programmes.

The students called off a three-day protest late last week when the university pledged to hold a town hall meeting on Thursday to allow them to air their grievances, and to reconsider its ties with Israeli academic institutions.

But acting director Jean Bassères said after the meeting he had “clearly refused to set up a working group on our relations with Israeli universities and partner companies”, prompting several dozen students to immediately resume their protest.

“A first student has started a hunger strike in solidarity with Palestinian victims, but more so to protest against the way Sciences Po is repressing students who want to show their support for Palestine,” Hicham, a pro-Palestinian Sciences Po student, told French media.

More would follow unless the elite university’s directors agreed to a public vote by its management board on reconsidering all partnerships with Israeli institutions, Hicham said.

Classes at two other universities and colleges in France, including the leading journalism school ESJ Lille, were briefly blocked on Thursday in small-scale protests, involving a few dozen students, inspired by those that have engulfed US campuses in recent weeks.

Bassères said he was aware refusing to reconsider relations with Israel could anger some protesters, but added that he was “calling on all to show a sense of responsibility” ahead of end-of-year exams due to start next week.

Student protests in support of Palestine have spread internationally.

Here’s Leyland Cecco for the Guardian, reporting on student demonstrations in Toronto, Canada.

Student demonstrators in Canada’s largest city have have set up an pro-Palestine encampment at the University of Toronto, demanding the university cut ties with the Israeli government and certain academic institutions as they push for a ceasefire in Gaza

The protest, the latest at a major Canadian university, comes after talks between the group Occupy for Palestine and university administrators failed to reach an agreement. Students breached a fence early Thursday morning. The barrier, erected by the university, was meant to deter similar protests seen on university campuses in the United States.

The university warned students that “unauthorized activities such as encampments or the occupation of University buildings are considered trespassing.”

In British Columbia, students at three post-secondary institutions have set up tent protests. “We commit to grounding ourselves in the cause of this encampment: solidarity with Gaza and the Palestinian people who are facing genocide,” organizers at the University of British Columbia said in a statement.

In Montreal, where a large encampment on the campus of McGill university has divided students and faculty, a judge recently rejected an injunction request from two students to move the camp. The students say the encampment interferes with their ability to safely attend class. The university has asked the police to dismantle the camp but also says it is the situation “advocating for a peaceful outcome.”