“DOWN WITH OCCUPATION”
Johnson’s visit to Columbia came as Texas deployed police in riot gear at the University of Texas in Austin where hundreds of protesters staged a boisterous walkout, chanting “down with occupation”.
Police said they had arrested more than 20 people, with the state’s governor Greg Abbott urging swift punishment.
“These protesters belong in jail,” he wrote on social media.
“Students joining in hate-filled, antisemitic protests at any public college or university in Texas should be expelled.”
Police were on scene in Los Angeles after hundreds of students began what they called an occupation on the campus of the University of Southern California.
Students chanted “Free free Palestine” as well as the controversial slogan “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” which some interpret as calling for the destruction of the state of Israel.
“We’re all just trying to advocate for our brothers and sisters in Palestine who just don’t have voice right now,” biology student Yaseen El-Magharbel told AFP.
The university said it was closing the campus to outside visitors, though classes and other activities would continue.
Students have also launched protests at schools including Yale, MIT, UC Berkeley, the University of Michigan and Brown.
Social media images showed an encampment taking shape at Harvard University.
Classes were moved online and other on-campus activities were cancelled at California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt, after protesters barricaded themselves in a campus building.
More than 130 people were arrested at a pro-Palestinian protest at New York University Monday night.
And police at the University of Minnesota reportedly detained nine people at an encampment.
NBC reported that the FBI is coordinating with universities over anti-Semitic threats and possible violence in connection with the ongoing wave of protests.
