Campuses of several US Universities have been witnessing massive protests with the students seeking a ceasefire in Israel's war with Hamas. Police have arrested over 550 protesters and some universities are witnessing violent clashes between cops and the activists.
Law enforcement officials at the behest of college administrators have deployed tasers and tear gas against students protesters at Atlanta's Emory University, even though the protests have been largely peaceful, say activists and media personnel present at the spot.
Emil' Keme, professor of English and Indigenous studies, at the University said that the scene reminded him of the civil war in Guatemala as a teenager.
"Police immediately began to force people to move. I felt like I was in a war zone, with all the police and their weapons, the rubber bullets. We were pushed away," Mr Keme told the Guardian describing what happened as soon as cops entered the Emory campus.
“Police took the student next to me, pushed an older lady nearby and then pushed me.”
Student protesters say they are expressing solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza, where the death toll has topped 34,305, according to the Hamas-run territory's health ministry. They want universities to cut their investments in everything tied to Israel and weapons that fuel the war in Gaza. That means funds run by BlackRock, Google as well as Amazon's cloud service, Lockheed Martin and even Airbnb.
Video circulated widely on social media shows two women who identified themselves as professors being detained, with one of them slammed to the ground by one officer as a second officer then pushes her chest and face onto a concrete sidewalk.
Atlanta police and Georgia troopers are leading a joint operation within the campus to dismantle the tents and camps the activists have set up at the school's quadrangle. Within minutes of the authorities entering the campus, 28 people, 20 of whom were "Emory community members", had been arrested, the institute said in a statement.
The school president said that the videos of police clashing with the students "are shocking" and that he is "horrified horrified that members of our community had to experience and witness such interactions."
The university's response was likely the quickest show of police force in response to a divestment protest among the dozens nationwide that have occurred in recent weeks. It was also probably the only one where pepper balls, stun guns and rubber bullets were used.
