By EFE
Apr 30, 2024, 1:34 PM EDT
NEW YORK – Former President Donald Trump this Tuesday compared the pro-Palestinian camp on the campus of Columbia University with the assault on the Capitol on January 6, 2021, an event that claimed seven lives when thousands of the Republican’s followers broke into the building
Dozens of students from Columbia University in New York occupied Hamilton Hall, one of the most important buildings in the educational complex, this Tuesday, hours after the center’s management began applying suspensions to students involved in the protests.
“They took over a building, that’s a big problem. And I wonder if what will happen to (the protesting students) will be something comparable to what happened to (the participants) on January 6, because they are causing a lot of destruction, a lot of damage and a lot of people being seriously injured,” he said. the former president and Republican candidate for this year’s presidential elections before entering his criminal trial in New York.
In addition, Trump pointed out that these rallies are a hotbed for anti-Semitism. He also specified that the president of the United States, Joe Biden, “has to come out and make a statement because universities are being invaded in this country.”
There has been a camp with letters on campus in Columbia for two weeks as a sign of protest and this anti-war movement has spread like an oil spill through dozens of universities across the country and some European faculties, becoming a major political problem. order.
The White House speaks out against the escalation of protests
The occupation of a Columbia University building in New York by demonstrators protesting against the war in Gaza has “absolutely the wrong approach,” the White House said Tuesday.
President Joe Biden “believes that the forcible takeover of a building on a university campus is absolutely the wrong approach and is not an example of peaceful protests,” said national security spokesman John Kirby.
Dozens of protesters occupied the Hamilton Hall building on the university grounds, like other higher education institutions, in protests against Israel and the links between universities and that country.
Kirby maintained that “hate proclamations and hate symbols have no place in this country” and added that these protests are being closely watched in the White House and the Security Council.
“A small percentage of students should not be able to interrupt the academic experience, the legitimate study for the rest of the students,” the official added.