Demonstrations, Protests and Riots

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    Iran Sentences Prominent Rapper to Death, Lawyer Says

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    The rapper, Toomaj Salehi, was initially arrested after releasing music in support of the 2022 protests over the death of a young woman in police custody.A dissident rapper has been sentenced to death in Iran after releasing music in support of antigovernment demonstrations that rocked the country in 2022, according to his lawyer, in a case that has prompted global condemnation.The rapper, Toomaj Salehi, 33, was one of the most prominent voices among those arrested over nationwide protests against Iran’s clerical rulers after the death in police custody of Mahsa Amini, 22. Human rights organizations have been calling for Mr. Salehi’s release, saying that he has been tortured in prison and warning that he could face execution.Amir Raesian, Mr. Salehi’s lawyer, told the Iranian reformist newspaper Shargh in an article published on Wednesday that a court in the central city of Isfahan had sentenced Mr. Salehi to death and that his client planned to appeal.The office of the U.S. Special Envoy for Iran condemned the sentence, calling it another example of “the regime’s brutal abuse of its own citizens, disregard for human rights, and fear of the democratic change the Iranian people seek.”Mr. Salehi was initially arrested in October 2022 for releasing music criticizing the government and backing the demonstrations ignited by the death of Ms. Amini in the custody of Iran’s morality police. He also posted videos on his Instagram account encouraging his followers to protest.The Iranian authorities charged him that November with “spreading corruption on earth,” an offense that can carry the death penalty. U.N. experts said the court proceedings were held behind closed doors without Mr. Salehi’s lawyer present and expressed alarm about reports the artist had been tortured, citing reports of his broken nose and several broken fingers.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump Compares Campus Protests to Violent White Supremacist Rally in Charlottesville

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      Former President Donald J. Trump on Wednesday played down the violence at a white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Va., in 2017 while portraying a recent wave of vocal but predominantly peaceful pro-Palestinian protests on college campuses as “riots.”One woman was killed and nearly 40 people were injured when an avowed neo-Nazi plowed his car through a crowd of counterprotesters during violent clashes in Charlottesville. Earlier, hundreds of white supremacists had marched through the city, carrying torches and chanting, “Jews will not replace us.”The current campus protests, while resulting in dozens of arrests, have had no reports of significant violence.In a post on his social media site, peppered with random capitalization, Mr. Trump said: “Joe Biden would say, constantly, that he ran because of Charlottesville,” he wrote of the 2020 election. “Well, if that’s the case, he’s done a really terrible job because Charlottesville is like a ‘peanut’ compared to the riots and anti-Israel protests that are happening all over our Country, RIGHT NOW.”Mr. Trump also repeated an attack on President Biden, saying that he “HATES Israel and Hates the Jewish people,” while adding “the problem is that he HATES the Palestinians even more, and he just doesn’t know what to do!?!?”Representatives for the Trump campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Biden campaign also did not immediately respond to a request for comment.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Campus Protests Over Gaza Intensify Amid Pushback by Universities and Police

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      There were dozens of new arrests as universities moved to prevent pro-Palestinian encampments from taking hold as they have at Columbia University.A wave of pro-Palestinian protests spread and intensified on Wednesday as students gathered on campuses around the country, in some cases facing off with the police, in a widening showdown over campus speech and the war in Gaza.University administrators from Texas to California moved to clear protesters and prevent encampments from taking hold on their own campuses as they have at Columbia University, deploying police in tense new confrontations that already have led to dozens of arrests.At the same time, new protests continued erupting in places like Pittsburgh and San Antonio. Students expressed solidarity with their fellow students at Columbia, and with a pro-Palestinian movement that appeared to be galvanized by the pushback on other campuses and the looming end of the academic year.Protesters on several campuses said their demands included divestment by their universities from companies connected to the Israeli military campaign in Gaza, disclosure of those and other investments and a recognition of the continuing right to protest without punishment.The demonstrations spread overseas as well, with students on campuses in Cairo, Paris and Sydney, Australia, gathering to voice support for Palestinians and opposition to the war.As new protests were emerging, the speaker of the House of Representatives, Mike Johnson, visited the Columbia campus in New York, where university officials were seeking to negotiate with protest leaders to end the encampment of around 80 tents still pitched on a central campus lawn.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Columbia Sets Midnight Deadline For Talks to End Encampment

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      The university, which asked the police to arrest protesters last week, will consider “alternative options” for clearing the lawn if an agreement is not reached.Columbia University set a midnight deadline late on Tuesday for an encampment of student protesters to disband, after which New York City police could be sent in to clear the grounds and make arrests.In an email to the university two hours before midnight, Columbia’s president, Nemat Shafik, said university administrators were in talks with student organizers in an attempt to reach an agreement before the deadline, after which the school would consider “alternative options” for clearing the lawn.Nearly a week ago, Dr. Shafik took the extraordinary step of enlisting city police in riot gear to arrest more than 100 activists who had refused to leave the tent village protesting Israel’s war in Gaza. That touched off criticism from all sides about her handling of the campus protests. The encampment re-emerged larger than the initial one after it was cleared.When Dr. Shafik’s letter landed in inboxes late Tuesday, protesters and others who were gathered outside the campus gates began reading it out loud. Chants rose up about the midnight deadline.On campus, the scene was mostly calm as about 100 people stood around talking to each other inside the encampment.After months of demonstrations on campuses protesting the war in Gaza, the unrest has reached a fever pitch in the final weeks of classes at some of the country’s most storied academic institutions. On Monday, police were called in to make arrests at Yale and New York University. Encampments have also sprung up at Tufts, Emerson and the University of California, Berkeley.Administrators have been struggling to balance students’ free speech rights and the need to protect Jewish students. Some demonstrations have included hate speech, threats or support for Hamas, the armed group based in Gaza that led attacks on Israel on Oct. 7, sparking the war.At Columbia, some faculty members circulated a draft resolution to censure the president over what they called an “unprecedented assault on student rights.” At least one major Jewish donor cut off support, saying the university was not doing enough to protect students. More

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      A Night Different From Others as Pro-Palestinian Protests Break for Seder

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      On the first night of Passover, the singsong of the Four Questions echoed from Jewish homes and gatherings around the world, including from unlikely, contested spaces: the center of pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia and other universities where demonstrations are taking place.As evening fell over Columbia’s tent encampment on Monday, about 100 students and faculty gathered in a circle around a blue tarp heaped with boxes of matzo and food they had prepared in a kosher kitchen. Some students wore kaffiyehs, the traditional Palestinian scarf, while others wore Jewish skullcaps. They distributed handmade Haggadahs — prayer books for the Passover holiday — and read prayers in Hebrew, keeping to the traditional order.But there were also changes and additions, like a watermelon on the Seder plate to represent the flag of Palestine. There were repeated references to the suffering of the Palestinian people and the need to ensure their liberation. There was grape juice instead of wine to respect the alcohol-free encampment, which was started last Wednesday and, despite a police crackdown last week, was stretching into its sixth day.The question asked each year — Why is this night different from all other nights?— echoed with new meaning.Jewish students served matzo at Columbia University at what they called a Gaza Liberation Seder on campus.Bing Guan for The New York TimesThe students read from handmade Haggadahs.Caitlin Ochs/ReutersAt other pro-Palestinian encampments and protests that have cropped up this week, similar scenes played out. Some protest organizers and participants are anti-Zionist Jewish students, and at Columbia, roughly 15 of the students who have been suspended for their involvement in the encampment are Jewish, organizers said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      On Columbia’s Campus, a Protest Encampment Grows and Tensions Flare

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      With a light blue academic robe tucked under her arm, Professor Marianne Hirsch hurried to get through a security line at a Columbia University entryway on Monday morning. To pass the gates, everyone had to scan IDs, in compliance with an announcement from the university’s administration that only students and faculty would be allowed on campus.Dr. Hirsch was not on her way to a graduation ceremony, however, but to protest the university’s president, Nemat Shafik. Last Wednesday, Dr. Shafik testified at a tense congressional hearing about antisemitism on college campuses, and the next day she called in the police to empty an encampment of demonstrators protesting the war in Gaza and the university’s ties to Israel. More than 100 students were arrested.“I am here because of her infringement on academic freedom in the congressional hearing and because of her decision to bring police on to campus to arrest students,” said Dr. Hirsch, a professor emerita in the English and Comparative Literature Department.Around and on Columbia’s campus on Monday — as protests unfolded under perfect blue skies, just hours before the beginning of the Jewish holiday of Passover — there was one sentiment shared by nearly everyone, no matter their viewpoint on the war: anger at Dr. Shafik.Students have been sleeping in tents on campus for several nights, and confrontations between protesters and counterprotesters have occasionally broken out both inside and outside Columbia’s gates. On Monday, the action on Broadway began at about 9:30 a.m., when several dozen people, several wrapped in Israeli flags, listened to a speech from Professor Shai Davidai, who has been a vocal critic of Columbia’s response to antisemitism on campus.A trio of women who live nearby saw Dr. Davidai’s posts saying he would be at Columbia and felt an urge to attend, despite needing to prepare Passover meals for dozens of guests.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Using Police to Clear Protesters, Universities Struggle to Calm Campuses

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      Students were arrested at N.Y.U. and Yale on Monday. But at Columbia, that approach led to a new encampment and demonstrations outside its gates.Police arrest protesters outside of New York University on Monday night. Adam Gray for The New York TimesAt New York University, the police swept in to arrest protesting students on Monday night, ending a standoff with the school’s administration.At Yale, the police placed protesters’ wrists into zip ties on Monday morning and escorted them onto campus shuttles to receive summonses for trespassing.Columbia kept its classroom doors closed on Monday, moving lectures online and urging students to stay home.Harvard Yard was shut to the public. Nearby, at campuses like Tufts and Emerson, administrators weighed how to handle encampments that looked much like the one that the police dismantled at Columbia last week — which protesters quickly resurrected. And on the West Coast, a new encampment bubbled at the University of California, Berkeley.Less than a week after the arrests of more than 100 protesters at Columbia, administrators at some of the country’s most influential universities were struggling, and largely failing, to calm campuses torn by the conflict in Gaza and Israel.Despite arrests at Columbia last week, protests continued on campus on Monday.C.S. Muncy for The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Dozens of Yale Students Arrested During Campus Protests

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      At least 47 people were arrested at Yale University on Monday during pro-Palestinian protests, as student-led demonstrations that roiled Columbia University and other campuses last week spread to the center of the school’s community in New Haven, Conn.Demonstrators set up an encampment at the campus’s Beinecke Plaza on Friday night. The group said in a statement on social media that it was calling on the university to disclose its investments in military weapons manufacturers and to divest from those companies.The first of the Yale students arrested today has been released and just gave a speech to the crowd, met with some of the loudest cheering I’ve heard in the last three days.47 students were arrested, according to organizers.“For our friends, we shall not be moved,” they sing. pic.twitter.com/25yAjMLgVo— Thomas Birmingham (@thomasbirm) April 22, 2024

      In a statement on Monday morning, Yale said it had repeatedly asked protesters to leave and warned that they could be arrested or face university discipline. The university also said it had offered the protesters audiences with leading trustees but had decided by late Sunday that negotiations were at an impasse.According to the university, the police issued 47 summonses on Monday and said arrested students could be disciplined by Yale itself, which could impose suspensions.“The university made the decision to arrest those individuals who would not leave the plaza with the safety and security of the entire Yale community in mind and to allow access to university facilities by all members of our community,” a university spokesperson said in a statement.The police action at Yale came four days after more than 100 students were arrested at Columbia University in New York at an encampment set up by pro-Palestinian demonstrators on the campus.This is a developing story. More

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      What We Know About the Protests at Columbia University

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      Demonstrations outside the school gates have added to the upheaval, with protesters who appear unconnected to the university targeting Jewish students.Columbia University is grappling with the fallout from its president’s promise to Congress that she would crack down on unsanctioned protests, and her decision to ask the police to clear an encampment on campus.Demonstrations just outside Columbia’s gates, which are currently closed to the public, took an especially dark tone over the weekend, when protesters who did not appear to be connected to the university were accused of celebrating Hamas and targeting Jewish students.“The decibel of our disagreements has only increased in recent days,” Nemat Shafik, Columbia’s president, said in a statement early Monday. “These tensions have been exploited and amplified by individuals who are not affiliated with Columbia who have come to campus to pursue their own agendas. We need a reset.”All classes on Monday would be held virtually, Dr. Shafik said, and university officials urged students to stay away from the campus in Upper Manhattan if they did not live on it.How Columbia got hereSince the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas on Israel, American college campuses have been hubs of protest and debate. The scene at Columbia has been particularly contentious, with protests drawing hundreds of demonstrators, and some faculty members drawing attention for statements that critics considered to be antisemitic.Columbia administrators, like their counterparts on campuses across the country, have struggled to fine-tune a response that balances discipline, free speech and institutional and national politics. For example, Columbia suspended two pro-Palestinian student groups after a walkout, and it has rewritten its protest policies, suspended some students and moved to cut or reduce ties to some faculty members.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More