College Democrats of America, the Democratic Party’s official student organization, on Tuesday endorsed the "protests for peace" across U.S. college campuses amid violent, weeks-long anti-Israel demonstrations that have shut down Columbia University.
"This past week, we witnessed heroic actions on the part of students around the country to protest and sit in for an end to the war in Palestine and the release of the hostages," College Democrats said in a Tuesday statement, expressing "solidarity with protests for peace" that have sprung up on college campuses nationwide.
"We commend the bravery of students across the country who have been willing to endure arrests, suspensions, and threats of expulsion to stand up for the rights and dignity of the Palestinian people," the statement added.
The Democratic student organization also slammed university administrators’ response to the protests as "deserv[ing] the strongest condemnation" because "arresting, suspending, and evicting students without any due process is not only legally dubious but morally reprehensible."
The College Democrats’ statement came just hours after anti-Israel protesters at Columbia smashed the glass doors of a campus building and barricaded the entrance while chanting and waving flags that featured anti-Semitic slogans such as "Long live the intifada." Columbia president Minouche Shafik in response to the takeover said she is shutting down the campus indefinitely.
Last week, the Ivy League university moved all of its classes online for the rest of the spring semester due to safety concerns after the anti-Israel demonstrations continued despite the arrests and suspensions of more than 100 students.
The protests at Columbia, which first began on April 17 when hundreds of students established an encampment on a campus lawn to demand the university divest from Israel, have since inspired similar protests at other universities, including New York University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Tufts University, Yale University, and the University of Texas, Austin.
Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., N.Y.) and Ilhan Omar (D., Minn.), both members of the progressive group of House Democrats known as the "Squad," also praised the anti-Israel campus protests across the country. Omar’s daughter, Isra Hirsi, was arrested and suspended from Columbia's Barnard College for her involvement in the campus protests.