Police forced out a pro-Palestinian group which staged an occupation overnight at Sciences Po in Paris, a top university known as a breeding ground for France’s political elite.
The occupation follows similar student movements — in protest against Israel’s war in Gaza — at major U.S. universities including Columbia in New York and UCLA in Los Angeles, which have triggered large-scale police responses.
Sciences Po’s administration decided to shut down access to its main facilities Friday after the Comité Palestine Sciences Po moved in to the university’s main building, located in the heart of Paris, “in support of the Palestinian people.”
The activist organization demanded that Sciences Po “takes a principled stance by sending an official communication condemning the actions of Israel that infringe upon the rights and well-being of Palestinians” and for the university to cut ties with “institutions or entities that uphold Zionist ideologies.”
In echoes of the U.S., pro-Palestinian student movements are organizing across France, with blockades and encampments being set up on university campuses amid an increasingly tense environment as Israel’s monthslong war on Hamas in Gaza drags on.
In a text message, the Comité Palestine Sciences Po told POLITICO that the protesters were offered by the university’s administration to remain inside a cafeteria without “any exterior contact.” The movement’s organizers refused the proposal which, they said, would’ve made it impossible to “stock up on food or talk to the press.”
The students were “peacefully evacuated” by police forces around noon Friday, the committee said.
Protesters on college campuses across the U.S. have set up encampments in opposition to Israel’s war, drawing a White House intervention and leading to police action this week which resulted in scuffles and arrests.
“Threatening people, intimidating people, instilling fear in people is not peaceful protest,” U.S. President Joe Biden said Thursday. “Dissent must never lead to disorder.”
Top French officials say they’re looking to avoid similar scenes of violence at their universities.
Prime Minister Gabriel Attal said last week that students would never be granted a “right to blockade” and pinned the protests on “an active, dangerous minority” which, he said, is looking to “impose” an “ideology from across the Atlantic.”
The conservative president of Paris’ Île-de-France region, Valérie Pécresse, said Monday that she was “suspending” all regional financing for the university “until serenity and safety are restored.”
University blockades have long been standard practice in French student activism, including during last year’s pension reform protests.
The pro-Palestinian students received support from most of the French left, with three-time presidential candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon calling the protesters at Sciences Po “our country’s honor against genocide” and Green Party lead candidate for the European election Marie Toussaint saying the movement “must not be repressed” and asked authorities to “leave students alone, especially when they organize for such worthy causes.”
Pro-Palestinian protests have sprung up on campuses elsewhere in Europe, including in Germany, Italy and the U.K.
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