LOS ANGELES — A police officer who was involved in clearing protesters from a Columbia University administrative building earlier this week fired his weapon inside the hallway, a spokesman for District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office confirmed Thursday.
No one was injured, according to spokesman Doug Cohen, who said there were other officers but no students in the immediate area. He said Bragg’s office is reviewing the incident. He did not provide additional details.
The New York Police Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The shooting occurred when police police raided Hamilton HallTuesday night, where pro-Palestinian protesters were barricaded inside for more than 20 hours. Video showed officers with armbands and riot shields walking past a second-story window. Police said protesters inside did not put up substantial resistance. More than 100 protesters were detained.
Protesters took over Hamilton Hall on Tuesday morning, increasing their presence on campus from an encampment that had been there since April 17.
The camp was one of the first on college campuses.
Despite more than 100 arrests on April 18 and the removal of tents, protesters defied threats of suspension to return to the camp. They then intensified their demonstration by occupying Hamilton Hall, an administrative building that was also occupied in 1968 by students protesting against racism and the Vietnam War.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. The previous AP story follows below.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Police have arrested more than 2,000 people during pro-Palestinian protests on college campuses across the United States in recent weeks, according to an Associated Press tally Thursday.
Demonstrations and arrests took place in almost every corner of the country. In the past 24 hours, they have drawn the most attention at the University of California, Los Angeles, where chaotic scenes unfolded on Thursday morning as police in riot gear charged into a crowd of protesters.
Hundreds of protesters at UCLA defied orders to leave, some forming human chains as police fired lightning to disperse the crowd.
At least 200 people were arrested, the sergeant said. Alejandro Rubio of the California Highway Patrol, citing data from the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. Rubio said they were being booked at the county jail complex near downtown Los Angeles.
Another 300 people left voluntarily during the hours-long standoff, some leaving the camp with their hands over their heads in a show of peaceful surrender, according to the university. Others fled as baton-wielding officers advanced on the hordes that numbered more than 1,000 people.
Later on Thursday morning, workers removed barricades and dismantled the protesters’ fortified camp. Excavators collected bags of trash and tents. Royce Hall was covered in graffiti.
Tent camps of protesters calling on universities to stop doing business with Israel or companies that say they support the war in Gaza spread to campuses across the country in a student movement unlike any other this century.
The manifestations started at Columbia University on April 17, with students asking the end of the Israel-Hamas war, which killed more than 34,000 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, according to the local Ministry of Health. Israel launched its offensive in Gaza after Hamas militants killed around 1,200 people, most of them civilians, and took around 250 hostages in an attack on southern Israel on October 7.
UCLA Chancellor Gene Block said in a statement Thursday that the camp had become “a focal point for serious violence as well as a major disturbance.” He said days of clashes between protesters and counterprotesters put people on campus in danger, students were unable to go to classes, buildings had to be closed and classes were cancelled.
“This past week has been one of the most painful times our UCLA community has ever experienced,” he said. “It has fractured our sense of unity and frayed our bonds of trust, and it will certainly leave a scar on campus.”
Police officers in riot gear descended on the UCLA campus by the hundreds on Thursday morning. Wearing visors and protective vests, they raised their batons to separate themselves from the protesters, who wore helmets and gas masks and shouted: “You want peace. We want justice.”
For hours, police warned over loudspeakers that there would be arrests if the crowd did not disperse. Protesters and police pushed each other and fought. Police helicopters hovered and the sound of explosions pierced the air. Police removed protesters’ helmets and glasses as they made arrests.
Police methodically destroyed the camp’s plywood barricade, pallets, metal fences and trash cans, then tore down awnings and tents.
The presence of law enforcement and continued warnings contrasted with the scene on Tuesday night, when counter-protesters attacked the pro-Palestine camp. Campus administrators and police did not intervene or call for backup for hours. No one was arrested, but at least 15 protesters were injured.
The late response drew criticism from political leaders including California Gov. Gavin Newsom, and officials promised an independent review.
Ariel Dardashti, a UCLA senior studying global studies and sociology, said no student should feel unsafe on campus.
“It shouldn’t get to the point where students are arrested,” Dardashti said on campus Thursday.
Dardashti said she identifies with the trauma suffered by Palestinians.
“When my father was fleeing Iran, he prayed that his children would not have to face anti-Semitism,” Dardashti said. “We are afraid of having to run away again the same way our parents did.”
Iranian state television broadcast live footage of the police raid at UCLA, as did Qatar’s pan-Arab satellite network Al Jazeera. Live footage from Los Angeles was also broadcast on Israeli television networks.
Israel classified the protests anti semitic, while Israel’s critics say the country uses these allegations to silence opposition. Although some protesters were caught on camera making anti-Semitic comments or violent threats, the protest organizers – some of whom are Jewish – consider it a peaceful movement to defend Palestinian rights and protest the war.
President Joe Biden on Thursday defended students’ rightsto peaceful protests, but regretted the disorder of recent days.
California Republican leaders criticized university administrations for failing to protect Jewish students and for allowing protests to devolve into “lawlessness and violence.” They called for the resignations of leaders at UCLA and California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt, and pushed for a proposal that would reduce salaries for university administrators.
“We have a lot of people at these universities making six-figure salaries and they have stood by and done nothing,” Assembly Republican Leader James Gallagher told reporters.
Meanwhile, school protest camps across the US have been evacuated by police – resulting in more arrests – or voluntarily closed.
An Illinois college professor said he suffered multiple broken ribs and a broken hand during a pro-Palestinian protest Saturday at Washington University in St. Louis.
Bystander video shows the arrest of Steve Tamari, a history professor at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. He appears to be approaching to take videos or photos of protesters being detained when several police officers violently take him down.
In a post on the social platform X, Sandra Tamari said that her husband needed surgery on his hand and has nine broken ribs.
Tamari said in a statement Thursday that it was “a small price to pay for Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza.” Campus police referred questions to the university’s communications department, which did not respond to a request for comment.
Elsewhere, University of Minnesota officials reached an agreement with protesters not to disrupt graduations. Similar agreements were made in Northwestern University, in suburban ChicagoRutgers University in New Jersey and Brown University in Rhode Island.
Meanwhile, a group of Columbia University professors condemned school leadership Thursday for calling on police to remove protesters, in what the group called a “horrific police attack on our students.” Officials broke into a building Tuesday, breaking up a demonstration that paralyzed the school and arrested more than 100 people.
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Watson reported from San Diego and Keller reported from Albuquerque, New Mexico. Associated Press journalists from around the country contributed to this report, including Ethan Swope, Krysta Fauria, Leslie Ambriz, John Antczak, Christopher L. Keller, Lisa Baumann, Stefanie Dazio, Jae C. Hong, Colleen Long, Karen Matthews, Sarah Brumfield , Carolyn Thompson, Philip Marcelo, Steve Karnowski and Eugene Johnson.
This story originally appeared on Time.com read the full story
