New York University students established a new encampment Friday evening after the NYPD roughly cleared a similar occupation earlier this week, arresting 120 protestors including NYU staffers.
The students, calling for divestment in Israel by their university, quickly set up tents behind the John A. Paulson Center near Bleecker and Mercer Sts. just after 5:30 p.m., chanting “Disclose, divest, we will not stop, we will not rest!”
Similar protests have popped up across the city and nationwide in recent days following the Columbia encampment that was launched on April 17.
A similar encampment Monday night at NYU’s Gould Plaza on W. Fourth St. was cleared by cops, who pepper-sprayed protestors and arrested students and faculty. Some protestors threw plastic water bottles and a metal chair at officers.
The NYPD was quickly called to the protest, with a few dozen officers standing on Bleecker St. by 6:23 p.m. as protestors targeted the university president directly chanting “Linda Mills, you can’t hide, you’re abetting genocide!”