About 20 Brown University students were arrested Wednesday after a five-hour sit-in by anti-Israel activists demanding the Ivy League school divest from companies with ties to the Jewish state.
The students are members of the BrownU Jews for Ceasefire Now group, which asked Brown president Christina Paxson to support their recommendation that the school’s endowment funds not be invested in companies doing business with Israel amid the war with Hamas, the Boston Globe reported.
“Given the ongoing carnage in Gaza supported by American aid, weapons, media, politicians and academic institutions, we, BrownU Jews for a Ceasefire Now, call on Brown University to do its part to promote an immediate ceasefire and lasting peace by divesting its endowment from companies that enable war crimes in Gaza,” their statement read.
“We will not leave University Hall until President Christina Paxson publicly commits to including and supporting a divestment resolution at the next Brown Corporation meeting,” the group vowed.
About 20 Brown University students were arrested for trespassing after the BrownU Jews for Ceasefire Now group demanded the school divest from companies with ties to the Jewish state. @jewsforceasefirenow / Instagram
More than 150 students also stood near the University Hall while singing and shining flashlights on their phones.
The protest began about 1 p.m. Wednesday and the arrests began about 6 p.m. when students were removed from University Hall by Providence police, according to reports. Those arrested were released without bail and are due back in court on Nov 28.
Brown said students living in the building were repeatedly warned that they would be arrested for trespassing at the end of the school day because of security issues, the Providence Journal reported.
“To protect the safety of all members and community amenities, students may not stay in non-residential campus buildings past normal operating hours,” Brown said in a statement. “The safety of our students is always our top priority.”
The students were charged with willful trespassing and released on their own recognizance.WLNE
The student group released its own statement, citing several members, including one of the organizers, Lily Gardner, a sophomore who was among those arrested for trespassing.
“As Jewish students grieving friends and loved ones, both Israeli and Palestinian, we have had enough of our university using us as a justification to maintain financial support of the apartheid state,” Gardner said in the statement.
“We are tired of pretending that our academic and personal lives should go on as usual,” he added.
Gardner told the Globe: “I think this is really necessary to break through the rhetoric, and without the allegations that these beliefs are antisemitic. We’re taking a stand for Brown.”
Brown spokesman Brian Clark told the Globe that the school “respects and upholds freedom of speech,” but that the “time, place and manner” is subject to on-campus rules only “to avoid disruption of the normal functioning of the university.”
The Ivy League school said the students violated fire code and had been warned repeatedly that they would be arrested.WLNE
He said the students involved violated the fire code by gathering in the hallway.
The group’s claim is based on a 2020 report compiled by an entity that advises on investment practices — with one of its recommendations being that companies should not receive investment support if they provide “products or services” that contribute to Israel’s occupation of the West. Bank, according to the Journal.
Among the companies mentioned are Boeing and General Dynamics.
Clark said that divestitures “of companies that facilitate Israeli actions in the Palestinian territories” were explored in 2020 by the University’s Advisory Committee on Corporate Responsibility in Investment Practices.
“The group’s recommendation to divest does not meet the standards set for identifying specific entities for divestment or articulating how financial divestment from that entity will address social harm as defined in the committee’s responsibilities,” he told the Globe.
BrownU group Jews for Ceasefire Now cites “the ongoing massacre in Gaza.” WLNE
“Therefore, it was not brought to the Brown Corporation for consideration,” Clark added.
On Tuesday, more than 160 Brown faculty members urged the school in a letter published in the Brown Herald to “join the international call for an immediate ceasefire.”
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