A New School student was arrested outside of the University Center after two counter-protesters pepper sprayed multiple protesters today at a rally to support the Faculty Solidarity Encampment. 

Protesters then sat in front of a New York Police Department car that held the arrested TNS student, leading to the arrest of over eight more people. Shortly after arresting about three people who were sitting in front of the police car, another protester threw water at a police officer, leading to about two other arrests. According to The New School’s Students for Justice in Palestine Instagram, 13 people were confirmed to have been arrested. 

The counter-protesters in support of Israel were apprehended by the NYPD for using pepper spray on the protesters and were seen harassing protesters while holding a tripod and recording them. The counter-protesters harassed the crowd for about 30 minutes until an NYPD officer escorted them across the street. However, the counter-protesters returned shortly after and continued to film the protesters. A protester then grabbed the tripod and broke it, leading the counter-protesters to pepper spray two protesters.

“[The counter protester] maced him directly in the back of his head hoping he would turn around, and that’s when I turned my head … and then I got shot across my face, and a woman got fully shot in one of her eyes,” Rowe Eis said, a third-year student at Eugene Lang College of Liberal Arts. “It was disturbing and it happened very fast.”

Shortly after, a protester was seen being arrested, allegedly due to attempting to intervene “to protect the people who were getting maced,” according to a TNS SJP Instagram post. Cresa Pugh, a sociology professor at The New School, witnessed the NYPD kettling the protester against the wall.

“They put him in this van simply for supporting Palestinian freedom,” Pugh said. Kettling is when the police force encloses “individuals with an intent to take police action against them without having individualized probable cause,” according to the New York State Attorney General, and is not allowed in the NYPD task force. 

As the NYPD officers moved the protester to the van, protesters surrounded them yelling, “Let him go.” Protesters then moved to the front of the NYPD van and refused to move. NYPD continued to surround the group in front of the van for about 20 minutes until about 60 NYPD officers arrived, many in riot gear, and began to apprehend protesters who continued to sit in front of the van. A protester was sitting in front of the van reading a book when two police officers lifted him off the ground and arrested him, as well as multiple others.

After these protesters were arrested, the crowd began to disperse. Then, another protester threw water onto a police officer, leading the NYPD to tackle and arrest two more protesters. After the water was thrown, an arrested protester stated that he got arrested for standing on the street. 

According to video footage from the New School Free Press, he was standing in the bike lane and fell to the ground due to police officers running after the protester who threw water at them. 

Christoph Cox, the executive dean at Lang, was seen at the rally after the protests. Cox states he doesn’t believe the university was involved with the NYPD presence at the rally. “I am certain that the President and Provost had zero desire to have any police relationship, any police contact today. I would be very surprised, and I would be truly horrified if that were the case,” he said.

Cox also expressed his support for students who choose to protest or occupy. “This has been a pretty peaceful occupation … I really wish that negotiations had turned out differently last Thursday, I think there was an opportunity for that. But beyond that, this is a deeply morally outrageous war, and students have every right to express themselves,” he said. 

The rally in front of the University Center has concluded, and protestors began moving to One Police Plaza around 9:15 p.m. for jail support. 

This is a developing story