More than 100 arrested at NYU protest; Columbia president urged to ...

A plywood wall was seen being erected around NYU's Gould Plaza early Tuesday, hours after about 150 pro-Palestinian demonstrators, in solidarity with their Columbia colleagues, were arrested for defying a university order to leave.

It comes amid escalating tensions over pro-Palestinian protests at college campuses in the city and across the U.S.

Last week, students set up an encampment on Columbia's South Lawn in Morningside Heights, a demonstration that coincided with the college president's trip to Capitol Hill to testify on campus antisemitism in the wake of the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel. Demonstrators oppose Israel military action in Gaza and demand Columbia, as well as NYU and an increasing number of colleges across America, divest from companies they claim "profit from Israeli apartheid."

More than 100 demonstrators were arrested when the university called in police to help dispel what the president argued had become an unruly and disruptive crowd. Similar encampments have since sprouted up at other universities in Manhattan and nationwide -- Yale and Harvard universities both saw classes disrupted by protests on Monday.

Columbia, still mired in the fallout from last week, moved all classes remote on Monday as a precaution. It intends to have a hybrid option available through the duration of the semester to help ensure students feel safe.

Mindful of the backlash Columbia faced for calling in the NYPD to dispel a Gaza protest last week, NYU officials ordered students and protestors to leave Gould Plaza by 4 p.m. Monday. It issued an order saying no additional protesters could join the group that had already assembled. More protesters came; many refused to leave.

Many of the protesters were not believed to be affiliated with NYU, which was also the case for Columbia last week. At the former, as far as Monday's protests, the head of Global Campus Security eventually said "enough."

"With the breach of the barricades this afternoon, that requirement was violated, and we witnessed disorderly, disruptive, and antagonizing behavior that has interfered with the safety and security of our community ... At one point, we explained to the protesters that they needed to disband in an hour, and there would be no adverse consequences." NYU said. “Nevertheless, many refused to leave. We also learned that there were intimidating chants and several antisemitic incidents reported. Given the foregoing and the safety issues raised by the breach, we asked for assistance from the NYPD. The police urged those on the plaza to leave peacefully, but ultimately made a number of arrests."

It wasn't immediately clear how many were arrested at NYU Monday, nor what charges they had faced. In the Columbia case, the NYPD responded to university complaints about trespassing and disorderly conduct.

Students say their mission extends beyond the concerns of any particular campus.

"We are young. We are in college. We have the ability and we are being educated on all of these things," one of the protesters said. "We take social science classes, we take classes that are supposed to illicit the humanity in us. This is the time we have to act. Saying that something is wrong or objecting to it in hindsight isn’t enough."

"It goes beyond Columbia it goes beyond NYU, it’s for the people in Gaza," the person continued. "It’s for the people in Palestine. It’s for their struggle. It’s for their liberation.”

Across from the NYU encampment, a smaller crowd of pro-Israel supporters pushed back. Overall, action from both sides has remained peaceful, though some say at times, the rhetoric has become incendiary. Both NYU and Columbia officials have publicly lamented having to bring in police to quash the protests.

Columbia University goes virtual on the sixth day of a pro-Palestinian encampment and protests on campus.

“It’s a really outrageous crackdown by the university to allow the police to arrest students on our own campus," said New York University law student Byul Yoon.

“Antisemitism is never OK. That’s absolutely not what we stand for and that’s why there are so many Jewish comrades that are here with us today,” Yoon said.

The protests have pitted students against one another, with pro-Palestinian students demanding that their schools condemn Israel's assault on Gaza and divest from companies that sell weapons to Israel. Some Jewish students, meanwhile, say much of the criticism of Israel has veered into antisemitism and made them feel unsafe, and they point out that Hamas is still holding hostages taken during the group's Oct. 7 invasion.

Tensions have continued to escalate at Columbia University as pro-Palestinian encampments spread to other campuses in the city, including NYU. Out of an abundance of caution, the Morningside Heights school ordered its classes go virtual. At NYU, demonstrators held their ground despite being given a deadline to disperse in the afternoon. NBC New York's Chris Jose and Jessica Cunnington report.

Tensions remained high Monday at Columbia, where the campus gates were locked to anyone without a school ID and where protests broke out both on campus and outside.

U.S. Rep. Kathy Manning, a Democrat from North Carolina who was visiting Columbia with three other Jewish members of Congress, told reporters after meeting with students from the Jewish Law Students Association that there was “an enormous encampment of people” who had taken up about a third of the green.

“We saw signs indicating that Israel should be destroyed,” she said after leaving the Morningside Heights campus. Columbia announced Monday that courses at the Morningside campus will offer virtual options for students when possible, citing safety as their top priority.

A woman inside the campus gates led about two dozen protesters on the street outside in a chant of, "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free!” — a charged phrase that can mean vastly different things to different groups. A small group of pro-Israel counter-demonstrators protested nearby.

No significant injuries have been reported.

Several students at Columbia and Barnard College said they were suspended for taking part in last week's protests, including Barnard student Isra Hirsi, the daughter of Democratic U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar.

Mayor Eric Adams has decried allegations of antisemitism and threats sprouting from the protests, saying earlier in the week he was "horrified and disgusted" to learn what had been happening at Columbia.

U.S. House Republicans from New York urged President Menouche Shafik to resign, saying in a letter Monday that she had failed to provide a safe learning environment in recent days as “anarchy has engulfed the campus.”

Protests have roiled many college campuses since Hamas’ deadly Oct. 7 attack on southern Israel, when militants killed about 1,200 people, most of them civilians, and took roughly 250 hostages. In response, Israel has killed more than 34,000 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, according to the local health ministry, which doesn’t distinguish between combatants and non-combatants but says at least two-thirds of the dead are children and women.

A new report from the Anti-Defamation League finds antisemitism has skyrocketed to record levels across the country, including the tri-state, as antisemitic incidents in New York and New Jersey more than doubled last year. The areas with some of the highest increases: Manhattan and Bergen County. NBC New York's Melissa Russo reports.