Pro-Palestine protests spread to European campuses: police attacked in Amsterdam and Berlin

Students across the UK, including in Cambridge and Oxford, have launched protests in solidarity with the Palestinian people and their fellow students around the world.

Similar to protests in the US, Canada and France, camps have been set up on campuses calling for a boycott of Israel and the withdrawal of investment from the country.

Students have set up camps at London University’s School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) and the universities of Oxford, Cambridge, Liverpool and Edinburgh.

In a joint statement, the organisers of Oxford Action for Palestine and Cambridge for Palestine said: ‘Over 100 universities around the world have decided to take bold and urgent action on behalf of Palestine. As members of these organisations, we reject our universities’ complicity in Israel’s war crimes against the Palestinian people and refuse to stand by while Israel legitimises its campaign of mass murder, starvation and displacement.

Protesters in Oxford and Cambridge arrived on Monday morning with supplies, sleeping bags and banners. The banners read ‘No more universities in Gaza’ and ‘Stop the genocide’.

A large banner reading ‘Welcome to the People’s University for Palestine’ was hung outside the camp outside Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford.

Oxford lecturers support protests

They also demanded that Oxford and Cambridge universities divest from all companies linked to Israeli genocide and occupation, support the rebuilding of Gaza’s education system, end institutional links with Israeli universities, and protect the safety of students and staff involved in pro-Palestinian actions.

Over 170 Oxford faculty and staff signed a letter in support of the camp and its aims.

Set up on King’s Parade in central Cambridge, the camp’s activities included ‘de-escalation’ training for protesters, a rally and a dinner funded by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign. The Guardian reports that a crowdfunding campaign has raised nearly £6,000 for vital supplies needed to make the camp long lasting, permanent and effective.

Other universities involved so far include University College London, Manchester, Newcastle, Sheffield, Leeds, Warwick, Swansea, Goldsmiths and Bristol in the UK, as well as Sciences Po in France, Trinity College Dublin in Ireland, the University of Lausanne in Switzerland and the University of Copenhagen in Denmark.

Police disperse camp in Berlin

On Tuesday, German police broke up a protest by hundreds of pro-Palestinian activists who had occupied the courtyard of Berlin’s Free University earlier in the day.

The demonstrators had set up around 20 tents and formed a human chain around them.

Police used loudspeakers to call on students to leave the campus.Police were also seen carrying some students away, and there were scuffles between police and demonstrators.

Police used pepper spray against some of the protesters. The school administration said in a statement that the protesters refused to engage in dialogue and that the police were called to evacuate the campus.

125 arrested in Amsterdam

On Tuesday, Dutch police arrested around 125 activists while breaking up a similar pro-Palestinian encampment at the University of Amsterdam.

In a statement on social media platform X, Amsterdam police claimed their actions were ‘necessary to maintain order’ after the protests turned violent.

Footage aired by national broadcaster NOS showed police using a mechanical digger to break down barricades and police with batons and shields moving in, beating some protesters and uprooting tents. According to NOS, the protesters had erected barricades made of wooden pallets and bicycles.

Demonstrators had occupied a small island at the university on Monday, calling for a break in academic relations with Israel over the war in Gaza.

Police ended the protest in Amsterdam early Tuesday afternoon by cordoning off the area with metal fences.

A statement from the school said police had ended the demonstration on the Roeterseiland campus on Tuesday evening ‘due to public order and security concerns’.

The war between Israel and Hamas is having a huge impact on students and staff. We share the anger and confusion about the war and understand that there are protests about it. We stress that dialogue on this issue within the university is the only solution,’ the statement said.

Protests also held in Finland and Denmark

In Finland, dozens of protesters from the solidarity group Students for Palestine camped outside the main building of the University of Helsinki and said they would remain there until Finland’s largest academic institution severed academic ties with Israeli universities.

In Denmark, students set up a pro-Palestinian camp at the University of Copenhagen, pitching some 45 tents outside the campus of the Faculty of Social Sciences.

The university said students were allowed to protest, but urged them to respect campus rules.

The statement argued that the administration ‘cannot and should not express opinions on behalf of university staff and students on political issues, including the ongoing conflict in Israel and the Palestinian territories’.

Demonstrations in Bologna, Rome and Naples

In Italy, students at the University of Bologna, one of the oldest universities in the world, set up a tent camp over the weekend to demand an end to the war in Gaza, as Israel prepared for an offensive in Rafah.

Student groups organised similar, largely peaceful protests in Rome and Naples.

More than a dozen tents were set up in a square named after a university student who fought against fascist rule during the Second World War. Some of the tents were decorated with Palestinian flags and banners reading ‘Student Intifada’.

Protest at Macron’s university

Student groups in Paris have called for a rally in solidarity with the Palestinians on Tuesday.

On Friday, French police ‘peacefully’ removed dozens of students who had gathered in support of the Palestinians at the Paris Institute of Political Studies, known as Sciences Po.

On Tuesday, students from the prestigious institute, whose alumni include French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal and President Emmanuel Macron, were seen entering the campus freely to take exams as police waited at the entrances.

Protests were also held at several other universities in France last week, including in Lille and Lyon. Macron’s office said police had been asked to remove students from 23 areas on French campuses.