State troopers cracked down on hundreds of students attending pro-Palestine demonstrations at the University of Texas in Austin on Wednesday, amid the latest wave of police interference shaking campuses across the U.S.
As students at the university staged a boisterous walkout chanting "down with occupation," state troopers on horseback were making their way through campus – while elsewhere police in riot gear were pushing back protesters, according to videos on social media.
At least two people had been arrested, the student newspaper The Daily Texan reported.
The standoff in Austin comes as ongoing protests at New York's Columbia University amid Israel's relentless war in Gaza have sparked intense attention from media and politicians – and similar demonstrations across the country.
An uneasy truce was in place between students and officials at Columbia on Wednesday, after a deadline to forcibly disperse their protest encampment expired.
Protesters say they are expressing solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza, where the death toll has topped 34,200 so far, and calling on Columbia to divest from companies with ties to Israel.
Tensions at Columbia reached their peak last week when more than 100 people were arrested after the university president Minouche Shafik called in the police.
University officials had set a deadline of midnight Tuesday to resolve the unrest. Still, as more people joined the protest overnight the school extended the deadline by 48 hours early Wednesday, students said on social media.
They agreed to the ongoing talks after the school promised not to call the police or National Guard, organizers with Columbia University Apartheid Divest said, calling the concession an "important victory."
"We fear that Columbia is risking a second Jackson State or Kent State massacre," the group said in the social media post.
They were referring to two 1970 incidents in which universities called the National Guard on student protesters, with fatal consequences.
Protesters – including a number of Jewish students – say they've disavowed instances of anti-Semitism and are there to support Palestinians.
