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Students gather in front of the Sorbonne University in support of Palestinians in Gaza, during the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, in Paris, France, April 29, 2024.
Student protests go global
As police ramp up efforts to dismantle pro-Palestine encampments and demonstrations on US campuses, the student protests are going global.
Students at four universities in Australia have jumped onto what they call a “global wave” of pro-Palestinian activism, vowing to occupy areas of campus with encampments until their schools cut financial ties with Israel.
In the Middle East, student protests are raging from Kuwait to Egypt to Lebanon, where students occupied central locations on campuses on Monday and Tuesday, calling for divestment and an end to the war in Gaza.
Tensions are also rising between students and authorities inFrance, a country with a history of protest and the largest Jewish population in Europe. Students in Paris at the Sorbonne and Sciences Po began occupying parts of their institutions last week. On Saturday, Prime Minister Gabriel Attal said his government “would not tolerate the actions of a dangerously acting minority trying to impose its rules and an ideology coming from North America,” while the president of the Île-de-France regionsuspended funding for Sciences Po until “calm and security have been restored.”
Encampments have also popped up at universities in the UK, Canada, Turkey, Germany, Japan, India, and Argentina. For many protesters, fighting for a cease-fire has taken on a larger meaning. They continue to call for divesting from Israel, but they also tie the plight of Palestinians to global structures of oppression and link the war in Gaza toissues like police brutality, the mistreatment of Indigenous people, racism, and climate change.
Campus protests spill over into US political sphere
Jon Lieber, head of Eurasia Group's coverage of political and policy developments in Washington, DC, shares his perspective on US politics.
This is what we are watching in US Politics this week: It's still the campus protests for the second week in a row.
This has been a pretty dominant story in US Politics, despite everything going on in the world. Antony Blinken trying to get peace in the Middle East. Donald Trump on trial. These campus protests have dominated headlines and are starting to spill over into the political sphere.
You've seen a number of Republican governors like in Georgia over the weekend, gleefully moving the police in, in order to crack down on a protest at Emory University. The University of North Carolina system has come out strongly against campus protests, and conservatives are rallying to support a bunch of frat boys that decided to defend the American flag against some protesters who wanted to put up a different flag.
Ben Sasse, former senator from Nebraska, is now the president of the University of Florida system, getting kudos online for his strong response. And you're getting protests that are turning increasingly violent at UCLA, at Columbia where a bunch of students occupied administrative building, leading Mayor Eric Adams to send in the police. President Biden this week gave an address to the nation on the student protests, asking for everybody to please calm down, clearly trying to align themselves with who are basically the normies of American politics who don't like this kind of campus protests and violence.
And Donald Trump getting in the game, trying to take advantage of the protests by claiming these are all left wing agitators who are aligned with the Democratic Party. This theme is going to continue throughout the campaign if the protests are sustained, which is, of course, a big question marks with campuses going home for their summer vacation in the next few weeks. So likely the story dies down but will come back to life later in the summer with any protests planned around the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
And of course, any protests that are launched on campuses when they come back in the fall, much closer to the election date. One thing this could be a preview of is organized activism against Donald Trump. Should he win the White House and immediately take actions to crack down on immigration in the United States, or any other hot bit social issue. You now have an organized protest movement that could carry itself into 2025, in the event of a Trump win.
U.S. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer speaks to reporters after the weekly policy lunch in the U.S. Capitol in Washington, U.S., October 29, 2019.
What’s in the antisemitism bill in Congress?
In response to roiling campus protests, the House of Representatives passed the Antisemitism Awareness Act on Wednesday. It attracted both bipartisan support and opposition — and now the Senate has a hot latke on its hands.
What does the bill do? It provides an official definition of antisemitic conduct that the Education Department could theoretically use to crack down on universities. If schools tolerate protesters who engage in what the bill defines as antisemitism, they could lose valuable federal research grants.
What’s the definition? It’s based on the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s “working definition of antisemitism,” which runs to over 500 words when contextual examples are included. It would condemnn not only threats against Jewish people but also certain criticisms of the state of Israel as antisemitic.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) framed the bill as a way to crack down on perceived antisemitism on campus, as Republicans attempt to use the campus protests to burnish their “law and order” credentials. The bill passed 320 to 91, but it attracted opposition from strange bedfellows.
Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY), a practicing Jew and self-described Zionist, said the bill goes too far in stifling free speech: “Speech that is critical of Israel alone does not constitute unlawful discrimination.”
Meanwhile, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) said she voted nay because the legislation could punish people who say Jews killed Jesus — itself a deeply antisemitic trope that has been used to target Jewish people for millennia.
What’s next? The bill is now in the hands of the highest-ranking Jewish official in US history, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), who is under pressure to bring it to the floor speedily. He was cagey on Thursday when talking to reporters about next steps. Ceding the “law and order” position to Republicans would be politically costly, but members including Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Jon Tester (D-MT) expressed concern over restricting free speech.
An Israeli soldier looks on from a vehicle near the Israel-Gaza border, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Israel, April 30, 2024.
Netanyahu: Rafah invasion looms, cease-fire or not
Despite offering a watered-down hostage deal proposal to Hamas, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday said an invasion of Rafah — the southern Gaza city where over a million Palestinians are sheltering — would move forward “with or without” a cease-fire.
Netanyahu's statement is likely meant to placate far-right members of his coalition government amid news of progress in truce negotiations. Hardliners want Israel to invade Rafah and have threatened to collapse the government if they don’t get their way.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is in the region for cease-fire talks, which come amid an ongoing push by the Biden administration for Saudi Arabia to normalize ties with Israel — a deal that would be a big diplomatic win for the White House during an election year. In exchange, Riyadh wants increased security cooperation with the US and help setting up a civilian nuclear program.
Still, Riyadh is unlikely to agree without commitments from Israel to work toward a pathway for Palestinian statehood, which Netanyahu opposes.
Where things stand. There are significant obstacles to a new cease-fire and Israeli-Saudi normalization. As Hamas mulls its response to Israel’s latest proposal, Blinken is set to meet with Bibi on Wednesday — and is expected to press him on increasing the flow of aid into Gaza.
People protest in support of Palestinians in Gaza, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Amman, Jordan, April 5, 2024.
The Arab world is also protesting over Gaza
Pro-Palestinian protests on US college campuses have dominated headlines recently, but the Gaza war has also catalyzed demonstrations in the surrounding region itself — and with the memory of the Arab Spring still fresh on their minds, leaders are responding with repressive tactics.
The Egyptian government has not taken kindly to pro-Palestinian protests that have also aimed at Cairo’s diplomatic ties with Israel. In early April, Egyptian authorities arrested at least 10 people at a protest where demonstrators accused Cairo of fueling the war in Gaza and called for the government to expel the Israeli ambassador.
Authorities in Morocco and Jordan have also arrested and prosecuted people who’ve criticized their government’s ties to Israel. Jordanian authorities have reportedly arrested roughly 1,500 over such demonstrations since October.
The Palestinian cause has been a rallying cry in the Arab world for decades. And without a cease-fire in Gaza, the war seems poised to continue stoking public outrage across the region.
That said, a Hamas delegation arrived in Cairo on Monday for further truce talks facilitated by international negotiators. Meanwhile, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Monday urged the militant group to accept an “extraordinarily generous” new proposal from Israel that lowered the number of hostages it wants to see released for a phased cease-fire to begin.
People attend a protest against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government and to call for the release of hostages kidnapped in the deadly October 7 attack on Israel by the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, in Tel Aviv, Israel, April 27, 2024.
ICC arrests and Rafah invasion threats loom
Some Israeli officials reportedly believe the International Criminal Court is preparing to issuearrest warrants for high-ranking Israeli officials and Hamas operatives. While such warrants may not ever result in a trial, they may be seen as another moral rebuke of Israel.
Neither the court nor Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office have commented, but Bibi did warn last week against ICC interference that “would set a dangerous precedent that threatens the soldiers and officials of all democracies fighting savage terrorism …”
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, meanwhile, is in Saudi Arabia on Monday and Tuesday for a World Economic Forum meeting, where he will discuss another cease-fire and hostage release deal for Gaza. The hope is to reach an agreement before Israel launches a ground operation in Rafah, which is expected soon unless Hamas accepts a deal.
While a cease-fire could stem hostilities, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan says only “a credible, irreversible path to a Palestinian state” will prevent a repeat of the current situation. This echoes recent Hamas statements, but a two-state solution is a non-starter for Netanyahu.
U.S. President Joe Biden raises a toast during the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner in Washington, U.S., April 27, 2024.
Pro-Palestine activists protest Biden, promote boycotts
President Joe Bidentook shots at rival Donald Trump at the annual White House Correspondents Dinner in Washington, DC, Saturday night, while pro-Palestinian protesters voiced their anger outside.
Demonstrators accused attendees of supporting Biden’s handling of the Israel-Hamas war and decried the killing of 97 journalists in Gaza, including 92 Palestinians. “Every single person in there is choosing to stay on the side of history that sides with profit over freedom,”said Mimi Ziad, a protest organizer from the Palestinian Youth Movement.
Those views have been gaining traction on campuses across the US, and now, Canada.Protesters at McGill University in Montreal set up an encampment and are demanding that the school divest from funds and companies associated with Israel. The move represents an escalation of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement inspired by student 1980s protests targeting apartheid that saw 150 schools divest from South Africa.
Will that happen with Israel? On Friday, Portland State University* President Ann Cudd said her school would pause receiving philanthropic gifts from Boeing, which provides equipment to the Israel Defense Forces, until students and faculty hold a debate in May.Other schools, including Harvard, Columbia, and the University of California, have thus far rejected calls for divestment.
* Correction: This article originally listed the University of Portland, rather than Portland State University.
How campus protests could influence the US presidential election
Jon Lieber, head of Eurasia Group's coverage of political and policy developments in Washington, DC, shares his perspective on US politics.
This is what we are watching in US Politics this week: Campus protests.
They're happening everywhere. Elite schools, state schools, the Northeast, the Midwest, Southern California, campus protests are a major story this week over the Israeli operation in Gaza and the Biden administration's support for it. These are leading to accusations of anti-Semitism on college campuses, and things like canceling college graduation ceremonies at several schools.
Will this be an issue of the November elections?
Really difficult to say. Everyone remembers in 1968, massive protest at the Democratic National Convention, contributing to President Nixon's message that he was the “law and order” candidate, and the Democrats didn't have control. That could easily be repeated this year if the protests continue and are sustained into August at the Democratic Convention in Chicago, where it also was in 1968. And then, if the protests continue on campus once again, when schools come back in in the fall, right before the November elections.
One thing we're watching is how Donald Trump tries to spin these things. A key campaign message that he's been pushing so far, this cycle, is that everything they're saying about him are the things they're actually doing. They thought he would get the US into a war with Iran, and now President Biden came right up to the verge of that last week. They say, “He's the chaos candidate,” and now you've got wars all over the globe, you've got campus protests, you've got a spike in crime, and you've got a massive immigration problem under President Biden.
So, that message is going to be one that Donald Trump continues to push and will definitely resonate with Republican voters and could potentially resonate with independent voters if the large-scale protests and clashes with police continue into the fall.