Hundreds join pro-Palestinian protests at Chicago universities; Northwestern encampment continues for 2nd night
Hundreds of protesters from the University of Chicago, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Columbia College Chicago and Roosevelt University rallied in support of people living in Gaza.
University of Chicago students, faculty members and their supporters protest and march around the South Side campus on Friday.
Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times
Students and faculty from several Chicago colleges and universities held pro-Palestinian protests Friday in an effort to show solidarity with demonstrations that have been roiling campuses across the country, including in downstate Urbana-Champaign.
Hundreds of demonstrators from the University of Chicago, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Columbia College Chicago and Roosevelt University marched, chanted and held up signs supporting Palestinians living in Gaza.
The rallies come a day after protesters formed an encampment on Northwestern University’s Evanston campus and spent the night outside. They echoed demands of protesters nationwide that universities should disclose — and unload — any investments in companies doing business with Israel or manufacturing weapons.
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In downtown Chicago, protesters managed to overtake the intersection of Michigan Avenue and Adams Street, near the Art Institute, around 1 p.m. Friday. Traffic had stopped in both directions. After a tense confrontation with police, the group was pushed into Millennium Park.
Rhoda Rosen, an adjunct professor at the School of The Art Institute, who is Jewish and South African, expressed her support for the protesters and their demands — she knows from experience, she said, the power of divestment.
“We support your vision of the School of The Art Institute of Chicago and we believe that’s it’s achievable, a vision that imagines what it would be like to be a part of a community that divests from those funds that support the destruction of Palestinian culture,” Rosen told the crowd Friday. “Know that calls for divestment from U.S. companies profiting from South African apartheid had a huge impact in South Africa.”
Officials with the School of the Art Institute did not respond to requests for comment.
Things got more heated at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign Friday. There, protesters attempted to set up tents and clashed with police Friday. There was one arrest.
Although police at Northwestern said they would arrest protesters who remained in the encampment after the school hastily banned tents Thursday, no arrests had been made as of Friday evening. Protesters said they planned to maintain the encampment indefinitely.
Students and faculty members from colleges across Chicago take to Michigan Avenue to protest in support of Palestinians in Gaza on Friday.
Jim Vondruska/For the Sun-Times
Ashley Bohrer, a Notre Dame professor who lives in Lincoln Park, said she has been “really inspired by what the Northwestern University students are doing. I’m here to stand up as a Jew and as an academic to say that Israeli apartheid does not stand for my values, and that university institutions, as centers of knowledge, have an obligation to tend toward social justice and truth.”
Organizers also called on the university to end its Israel Innovation Project, a STEM program where students, faculty and staff collaborate with counterparts in Israel.
Asked about the protest, a spokesperson shared a statement on the university’s position on the encampment saying “the safety of all members of our community cannot and will not be compromised, nor can their expression disrupt the learning environment or University operations.”
At the University of Chicago in Hyde Park, hundreds of people protested outside Levi Hall on campus.
“It is our duty to separate bombs from education,” said one speaker to the crowd. “We want this university to invest in us, not war machines.” Protesters chanted, “Money for jobs and education, not war and occupation.”
Local protest organizers also called on their schools to refuse future donations from the Crown family, who own a 10% stake in defense company General Dynamics. The University of Chicago is home to Crown Family School of Social Work, Family and Practice, and the family has endowed a professorship at SAIC. The family is a major donor to many universities.
In a statement to the Sun-Times, UChicago said its role is to be a “home and sponsor of critics” — but it will not take on the role of critic itself, out of concern it would “diminish” its ability to educate.
“The university has developed a consensus against taking social or political stances on issues outside its core mission,” the statement said. “Doing this through investments or other means would only diminish the university’s distinctive contribution — providing a home for faculty and students to espouse and challenge the widest range of social practices and beliefs.”
Roosevelt and Columbia did not respond to requests for comment, nor did representatives for the Crown family.
University of Chicago students, faculty members and their supporters rally outside Levi Hall in the South Side campus on Friday.|Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times
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University of Chicago students, faculty members and their supporters rally outside Levi Hall in the South Side campus on Friday.|Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times
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University of Chicago students, faculty members and their supporters march around the South Side campus on Friday.|Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times
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University of Chicago students, faculty members and their supporters march around the South Side campus on Friday.|Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times
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University of Chicago students, faculty members and their supporters march around the South Side campus on Friday.|Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times
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University of Chicago students, faculty members and their supporters march around the South Side campus on Friday.|Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times
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University of Chicago students, faculty members and their supporters march around the South Side campus on Friday.|Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times
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Sanya Bharti, 21, leads a chant with other University of Chicago students, faculty members and supporters as they protest at the South Side campus on Friday.|Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times
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University of Chicago students, faculty members and pro-Palestinian protesters march around the South Side campus on Friday.|Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times
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University of Chicago students, faculty members and pro-Palestinian supporters rally outside Levi Hall in the South Side campus on Friday.|Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times
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University of Chicago students, faculty members and pro-Palestinian supporters rally outside The Keller Center in the South Side campus on Friday.|Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times
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University of Chicago students, faculty members and pro-Palestinian protesters rally outside Levi Hall in the South Side campus on Friday.|Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times
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University of Chicago students, faculty members and pro-Palestinian protesters march around the South Side campus on Friday.|Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times
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University of Chicago students, faculty members and pro-Palestinian protesters march around the South Side campus on Friday.|Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times
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The rallies in Chicago did not lead to extended clashes with police, or any arrests, and protesters did not attempt to set up encampments or spend the night.
No major counter-protests materialized Friday, either. In Evanston, Haim Engelman, an MBA student at Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management, spent several hours at the protest on Friday to show support for Israel.
“I’m out here calling to free the hostages. I’m out here saying, ‘Am Yisrael chai,’ the nation of Israel lives,” Engelman, 31, said. He added that he plans to keep showing up “until the president of this university enforces his own rules” and clears out the encampment.
Contributing: Aidan Sadovi
Students and faculty members from colleges across Chicago take to Michigan Avenue to protest in support of Palestinians in Gaza on Friday.|Jim Vondruska/For the Sun-Times
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Students and faculty members from colleges across Chicago take to Michigan Avenue to protest in support of Palestinians in Gaza on Friday.|Jim Vondruska/For the Sun-Times
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Students and faculty members from colleges across Chicago take to Michigan Avenue to protest in support of Palestinians in Gaza on Friday.|Jim Vondruska/For the Sun-Times
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Students and faculty members from colleges across Chicago take to Michigan Avenue to protest in support of Palestinians in Gaza on Friday.|Jim Vondruska/For the Sun-Times
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Chicago Police speak to organizers as students and faculty members from colleges across Chicago take to Michigan Avenue to protest in support of Palestinians in Gaza on Friday.|Jim Vondruska/For the Sun-Times
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Students and faculty members from colleges across Chicago rally in Millennium Park to protest in support of Palestinians in Gaza on Friday.|Jim Vondruska/For the Sun-Times
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Students and faculty members from colleges across Chicago rally in Millennium Park to protest in support of Palestinians in Gaza on Friday.|Jim Vondruska/For the Sun-Times
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Chicago police officers keep watch as students and faculty members from colleges across Chicago take to Michigan Avenue to protest in support of Palestinians in Gaza on Friday.|Jim Vondruska/For the Sun-Times
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College students from universities around the city take over Millennium Park on Friday to protest the Israel-Hamas war.|Jim Vondruska/For the Sun-Times
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Students and faculty members from colleges across Chicago take to Michigan Avenue to show their support for Palestinians in Gaza on Friday.|Jim Vondruska/For the Sun-Times
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Students and faculty members from colleges across Chicago take to Michigan Avenue to protest in support of Palestinians in Gaza on Friday.|Jim Vondruska/For the Sun-Times
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Students and faculty members from colleges across Chicago take to Michigan Avenue to protest in support of Palestinians in Gaza on Friday.|Jim Vondruska/For the Sun-Times
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Students and faculty members from colleges across Chicago rally in Millennium Park to protest in support of Palestinians in Gaza on Friday.|Jim Vondruska/For the Sun-Times
The People’s Art Institute accused law enforcement of yanking people’s hair, strangling and hitting people with batons and metal fences at the Saturday protest.
Around daybreak Tuesday, campus officers surrounded the university’s main quadrangle and kept students from entering, according to reports from the scene.
Según los informes, en el campus de Lincoln Park de DePaul los contra manifestantes intentaron enfrentarse a los manifestantes, pero los pro palestinos utilizaron tácticas de desescalada para mantener la paz. En todo el país se ha detenido a más de 2,500 manifestantes desde el 18 de abril.
The University of Chicago Faculty for Justice in Palestine on Monday reaffirmed support for the “peaceful, welcoming and educational space” students had created and called on school leadership to return to “good-faith” negotiations.
An official familiar with Israeli thinking says Israeli officials are examining the cease-fire proposal approved by Hamas. But the official warns that the plan “is not the framework Israel proposed.”
Counterprotesters at DePaul’s Lincoln Park campus reportedly tried to clash with pro-Palestinian protesters. Nationwide, more than 2,500 protesters have been arrested since April 18.
Police said the museum asked them to clear the encampment on Saturday, hours after organizers set up tents in the Art Institute’s North Garden which they said were intended to pressure the school regarding the “occupation of Palestine.”
On a mostly peaceful day, tensions briefly bubbled over when counter-protesters confronted the demonstrators at the university’s Edward Levi Hall. An altercation prompted campus police to respond.
Las protestas contra la guerra han invadido los campus universitarios en las últimas semanas. Los estudiantes apoyan a los palestinos en los ataques de Israel contra Gaza, denuncian lo que llaman censura por parte de sus universidades y piden a las instituciones que dejen de invertir en fabricantes de armas y empresas que apoyan a Israel.
Tensions were higher Tuesday when hundreds of New York police officers raided Columbia University and City College of New York while a group of counterprotesters attacked a student encampment at UCLA.
“I remember coming out of my apartment one day and spotting Chicago cops dragging young protesters out of one section of Lincoln Park and shoving them into trucks, while nearby poet Allen Ginsberg was chanting in a circle of peaceful protesters not far away from the radical Abby Hoffman,” remembers Dan Webb, who later became a U.S. attorney.
Anti-war protests have swept college campuses in recent weeks as students support Palestinians in Israel’s attacks on Gaza, decry what they call censorship from their universities and call on institutions to divest from weapons manufacturers and companies supporting Israel.
Hundreds of University of Chicago students set up an encampment in the Main Quadrangle on Monday, joining groups on over 100 university campuses nationwide in support of Palestinians.
“Bad actors are using the cover of free speech in this moment of tension to normalize dangerous ideas that cause real harm to Jewish students and communities,” the museum said. But a member of Chicago’s Jewish Voice for Peace said the protesters are saying what Jewish institutions are “afraid to say.”
As the death toll mounts in the war in Gaza and the humanitarian crisis worsens, protesters at universities all over the U.S. are demanding that schools cut financial ties to Israel and divest from companies they say are enabling the conflict.
Students linked arms and formed a line against police after Northwestern leaders said the tent encampment violated university policy. By 9 p.m. protest leaders were told by university officials that arrests could begin later in the evening.
The video is the first proof of life of Hersh Goldberg-Polin, who was captured Oct. 7 in southern Israel. His parents have Chicago ties. Last week, his mother was named one of Time magazine’s most influential people of 2024.
A window of the Andersonville feminist bookstore displaying a Palestine flag and a sign calling for a cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas war was shattered early Wednesday. Police are investigating.
The Democratic president Wednesday reached the end of a long, painful battle with Republicans to secure urgently needed replenishment of aid for Ukraine.
Chicago Reps. Delia Ramirez, Jesus ‘Chuy’ Garcia and Jonathan Jackson, all Democrats and the most pro-Palestinian members of the Illinois delegation, voted no on aid to Israel. GOP Rep. Darin LaHood split from his party to support aid to Ukraine.
The group that blocked George Lucas from building a museum on Soldier Field’s south parking lot says the stadium project could ultimately end up in court — even if filing another lawsuit is “not the first thing you want to do.”
Multiple rounds of storms accompanied by strong winds and hail moved through the area, the National Weather Service said. Hail is reported in Hyde Park. A ground stop was issued for O’Hare Airport, where 119 flights were canceled.
