A pro-Palestinian protest at Emory University descended into chaos on Thursday, with multiple students arrested after Atlanta police and Georgia state troopers responded to the scene.
Police wrestled multiple students to the ground, and at least one student was tased, video of the protests posted to social media shows. Other students were seen being led away in handcuffs.
Some witnesses said police used pepper spray to control the crowd.
Atlanta cops tased and restrained one protester. pic.twitter.com/8zd4rIbFdi
— Kyle Becker (@kylenabecker) April 25, 2024
JUST IN: Chaos erupts as Georgia police officers reportedly fire rubber bullets into a crowd at Emory University.
The incident happened after students set up a Gaza solidarity encampment at the quad.
The protestors are "demanding total institutional divestment from Israeli… pic.twitter.com/vukOzrpMEz
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) April 25, 2024
The Emory protesters were protesting the Israel-Hamas war, but also the construction of a police training facility at an abandoned Atlanta prison, dubbed “Cop City” by opponents.
In an article the Emory protesters published online, the protesters wrote they were “demanding total institutional divestment from Israeli apartheid and Cop City at all Atlanta colleges and universities.”
On Thursday morning, several dozen people set up camp on the university’s lawn with tents and signs.
President Gregory Fenves said many of those initial protesters were outsiders.
“Early this morning, several dozen protesters entered our Atlanta campus and set up an encampment on the Quad,” Fenves said in an email to the school community.
“These individuals are largely not affiliated with Emory and were disrupting the university as our students finish classes and prepare for finals. This is completely unacceptable. In response to this encampment, the Emory Police Department notified these individuals that they were trespassing. When they refused to leave, law enforcement cleared the Quad,” Fenves said.
Emory police Commander Thomas Mann agreed, saying some of the protesters were not affiliated with the university.
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“The ones that were arrested, there wasn’t anything peaceful about what was going on,” the police commander told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Some of those arrested will be charged with criminal trespass and assaulting police officers, he said.
Rowdy protests have also broken out over the last week at other universities across the country.
In New York City, demonstrations erupted at Columbia, Harvard, and New York University, where 133 protesters were arrested. In the Boston area, students protested at both Harvard and Northeastern University. Another Ivy League school, Brown University in Rhode Island, saw protests as well. Yale University in Connecticut saw more than 40 protesters arrested.
In Texas, the University of Texas at Austin saw students demonstrate as police struggled to control the crowd, at one point knocking over a man holding a large camera.
In California, students protested at University of Southern California where 93 people were arrested.