Students and faculty held a press conference at Virginia Tech on Thursday evening to challenge the university’s account of a pro-Palestinian encampment that was dismantled late Sunday night, resulting in 82 trespassing arrests.
After the encampment was broken down by Virginia Tech police late Sunday night with assistance from Virginia State Police and local police departments, the university has continued to suppress student-led protests by “heavily policing, intimidating, and threatening retaliation against its own students and faculty who want to continue exercising their constitutional rights,” said Desiree Poets, an assistant professor in the political science department at Virginia Tech.
Sands has since reached out to a few students who were arrested at the protest, said Shahed Sanuri, one of several students who spoke at the press conference. But he hasn’t issued a formal apology, visited the protesters or contacted any Palestinian students who had been arrested, she said.
Sanuri said the group has reached out to request a meeting with Sands.
When asked by email Thursday evening if Sands had been in contact with any of the arrested students or faculty members, university spokesperson Michael Stowe responded, “Yes, he did. As he mentioned in his message earlier this week, President Sands regularly engages with student groups.”
[Read more: Students, faculty arrested at Virginia Tech now face possibility of university discipline]
Pro-Palestinian movement on campus began in October
The protesters’ grievances with university President Tim Sands and administration at the public university go back to October, when Sands released a statement expressing sorrow about the October 7 terrorist attacks by Hamas in Israel that served as catalyst for ongoing violence in Gaza.
That statement did not recognize the Palestinian death toll from Israeli military strikes that followed the initial attack.
The protest group Thursday went on to recount events throughout the fall and spring that led up to the encampment on the lawn of the Graduate Life Center that lasted three days before it was broken up by campus police; of the 82 people arrested, 53 were students.
The encampment called on Tim Sands to meet with students and consider their demands to divest from Israeli investments, make an official university statement condemning the violence in Gaza and acknowledge suppression of Palestinian students and their allies.
Students from the Students for Peace and Justice in Palestine, the Muslim Student Association, the Middle Eastern and North African Student Association repeatedly asked for a meeting with Sands. That meeting took place in mid-November.
“Our most immediate and critical ask was for Sands and the administration to release a statement equally recognizing the immense loss of life in Gaza as a result of the Israeli regime’s attacks,” Habeed read. The statement went on, “Our request was met with reluctance. Sands expressed more concern about his donors and their response, placing institutional profit over the wellbeing of people,” said student Faatina Hameed on Thursday evening, reading from a statement that had been posted on the Instagram accounts for Students for Justice and Peace in Palestine and VT4Palestine earlier in the afternoon.
Sands did release a statement following the November meeting that included the statement, “We are deeply troubled and saddened by the loss of innocent lives and the growing Palestinian refugee crisis in Gaza and fervently hope a resolution can be found to ease the suffering and end the fighting.”
But the students were unsatisfied, and continued to call for a louder response from the university throughout the academic year. The graduate senate approved a statement denouncing the Israeli attacks on education and research in Gaza and calling for Tech to divest, but contended at the press conference Thursday that similar statements in the faculty senate and undergraduate student senate stalled due to administration intervention.
Protesters: Sands’ remarks on protest reinforce implication Palestinian students not welcome
The students’ efforts culminated in an encampment on the lawn of the Graduate Life Center that began early in the morning on Friday, April 26.
It continued peacefully through the weekend, but Virginia Tech police abruptly told the group on Sunday afternoon the camp needed to come down, the protesters said. The protesters called for Sands to come speak with the group. Vice President of Student Affairs Frances Keene came to the encampment, but according to the protesters, she wasn’t willing to discuss their demands. She said instead, “I am not here to discuss why you are here, but only to tell you that you have to leave,” according to the statement read on Thursday.
Stowe wouldn’t comment Thursday afternoon on Keene’s involvement or the timeline of Sunday’s orders to break down the camp, referring only to the university’s response memo and Sands’ Monday letter.
Sands said in that message that he was “deeply disappointed to see members of our community choose uncivil and unlawful behavior over purposeful engagement in difficult conversations and robust debate that should be part of the Virginia Tech experience.”
Bikrum Gill, an assistant professor of political science who spoke at the Thursday press conference after being arrested at the encampment, said that Sands’ statements about the student protestors were “very much in line” with statements by Gov. Glenn Youngkin.
Youngkin appeared on CNN and posted on X, formerly Twitter, over the weekend, calling college campus protests “antisemitic” and saying they “endanger public safety.”
Remarks like Sands’ and Youngkin’s reinforce the idea that “our Palestinian students as not a welcomed part of this community,” Gill said.
“There were 20 to 30 people here at 2:30 p.m. on Sunday” when the camp was told to disband, Poets added. “The response that Virginia Tech chose to take was not a necessity.”