Around 50 students from NYU, The New School and Cooper Union took to Washington Square Park on Thursday afternoon to demand the colleges divest from companies with ties to Israel and pardon students facing disciplinary action for participation in pro-Palestinian protests. The rally was held a year after Gaza Solidarity Encampments swept universities across the nation, and proceeded what’s now a federal crackdown on students who spearheaded the demonstrations.

Participants chanted “disclose, divest, we will not stop, we will not rest” and “hands off Gaza,” and held signs reading “END THE ABDUCTION OF SUPPORTERS OF PALESTINE” and “FREE PALESTINE, NYU DIVEST.” In interviews with WSN, students said they sought to reiterate demands from the past year of protests and scale pressure as the Trump administration detains and deports noncitizen students and faculty. 

“They’re trying to invoke fear in us, but ultimately we sound fearless,” Ebtesham Ahmed, a representative for NYU’s chapter of Students for a Democratic Society, told WSN. “We’re going to continue to protest, we’re going to continue to fight back and we’re going to continue to mobilize the students — we also make sure that we protect our fellow students.” 

The group marched east from Washington Square Park toward the Cooper Union building, before turning north on Lafayette Street and ending at The New School. As dozens of New York City Police Department officers lined the streets, most protesters wore masks or covered their head and face in keffiyehs to avoid identification.

The protest comes as nearly 200 universities signed onto a letter condemning President Donald Trump’s efforts to slash federal research funding, dismantle diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, and revoke hundreds of student visas. Despite endorsement from presidents at several peer universities — including Columbia University, Harvard University and Yale University — NYU President Linda Mills was not among the signatories. 

“NYU has an amazing student body, but the institution itself is frankly pathetic,” a Tisch junior, who requested to remain anonymous out of fear of retaliation, told WSN. “To see so many universities stand up for what is right is so hopeful — but then seeing our university do the complete opposite isn’t unexpected, but it’s disappointing.”

Flyers handed out at the rally detailed NYU’s immigration policy for noncitizens, which stipulates that the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers cannot enter campus buildings unless they have a warrant. The flyers also criticized NYU for not disposing of its disciplinary records — which they said could be abused by the Trump administration to justify deportations — and urged people to scan a QR code and send a pre-written email demanding Mills to delete the information. 

Since Trump took office, NYU administrators have sent four universitywide emails clarifying immigration policy and linking on-campus resources, directed students to its Immigrant Defense Initiative and held support sessions to address more individual concerns. Students have continued to call for a more robust alert system to warn students of immigration authorities on campus and publicly affirm its support for international students. 

“It sets a really dangerous precedent,” a Tandon graduate student, who requested to remain anonymous due to safety concerns, told WSN. “When you start not having due process for people, that’s really dangerous and it makes anyone able to be a target.”

Contact Amanda Chen at [email protected].