A protest camp at Swarthmore College on 24 April 2024 in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania. Photograph: Matthew Hatcher/Getty ImagesView image in fullscreenA protest camp at Swarthmore College on 24 April 2024 in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania. Photograph: Matthew Hatcher/Getty ImagesPennsylvaniaPolice disband pro-Palestinian camp at Swarthmore College and arrest nine activistsSome students were also temporarily suspended as other colleges respond with disciplinary action to protestsMelissa HellmannSat 3 May 2025 20.21 BSTFirst published on Sat 3 May 2025 00.55 BSTShareOn the morning of 3 May, the Swarthmore borough police department disbanded a four-day pro-Palestinian encampment on Swarthmore College’s campus and arrested nine activists. One current and one former Swarthmore College student were among the arrested, while the rest were from outside of the college community, the college’s president, Valerie Smith, said in a statement.“With rising concerns about safety and security on campus, a continued and growing presence of individuals unaffiliated with the college, warnings from outside law enforcement agencies and no signs that protestors were willing to engage in conversation that would bring the encampment to an end,” Smith said, “I felt we had no choice but to seek outside assistance from local law enforcement.”The sweep of Swarthmore College’s encampment followed the interim suspension of a total of seven Swarthmore College students for erecting the encampment earlier in the week. The students in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, were suspended without due process and were told to evacuate from campus, said Swarthmore’s Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) group in a 2 May statement.Of the students who were temporarily suspended, several were people of color, or first-generation, low-income students, the statement said, continuing:: “This is part of a disturbing trend of Swarthmore exploiting the vulnerabilities of student protesters on the basis of racialized discrimination.” The students on interim suspension are banned from attending college events or setting foot on campus. Swarthmore SJP did not respond to a request for comment by the publication date.In a 1 May statement to the campus community, Smith said that the protesters had vandalized campus property. “Should they continue to fail to disperse and violate the college’s policies and the law,” Smith said, “we will have no choice but to escalate our response as we consider all actions to bring the encampment to an end.”SJP used social media to encourage activists outside of the college to join the encampment, Smith said, and they ignored repeated requests to vacate Trotter Lawn, where they erected the camp. “We informed students multiple times, both verbally and in writing, that they were violating several policies in the student code of conduct. Students were instructed to disband the encampment and leave Trotter Lawn, and repeatedly warned that failure to do so would lead to interim suspensions.”Swarthmore College is one of 60 schools under investigation for what the Trump administration considers antisemitic harassment on campus.Trump repeats legally dubious threat to ‘take away’ Harvard’s tax-exempt statusRead moreA handful of higher-education institutions have started campus encampments this spring in a revival of last year’s pro-Palestinian movement in opposition to Israel’s war on Gaza, where at least 62,000 Palestinians have been killed since 7 October 2023, when roughly 1,100 Israelis were killed. But this year, pro-Palestinian campus protests have been dampened by crackdowns and punitive measures from the Trump administration.On Yale University’s campus in late April, hundreds of student protesters set up an encampment that dispersed within a couple of hours. Some of them are facing disciplinary action from the university. And at Tulane University, seven students are facing punitive measures including suspension or expulsion for attending an off-campus protest in New Orleans demanding the release of the pro-Palestinian former Columbia University student Mahmoud Khalil. This article was amended on 3 May 2025 to correct an inaccurately referenced 2024 Yale encampment.Explore more on these topicsPennsylvaniaUS universitiesProtestUS campus protestsIsrael-Gaza warnewsShareReuse this content
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