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April 25 (UPI) -- Boston police cleared a tent encampment at Emerson College and arrested more than 100 protesters overnight, the school's president said Thursday, as pro-Palestinian demonstrations rile universities the country over. The encampment had been erected in Boylston Place Alley days earlier by Students for Justice in Palestine, which seeks to create a student movement in support of Palestinians, according to its website.
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Boylston Place Alley is not entirely owned by the school, and the university had warned Wednesday that the protesters were risking "legal consequences beyond Emerson's control." Local police had informed the school that some of the demonstrators' actions violated city ordinances, including the prohibition of tents in a public right-of-way.
The school added that it was concerned over credible reports it had received of some protesters "engaging in targeted harassment and intimidation of Jewish supporters of Israel and students, staff, faculty and neighbors seeking to pass through the alley."
"Emerson College recognizes and respects the civic activism and passion that sparked the protest in Boylston Place Alley in support of Palestine while also holding and communicating concerns related to the numerous ordinance violations caused by their encampment," Emerson President Jay Bernhardt said in a statement Thursday.
"We also understand that clearing the encampment has significantly and adversely impacted our community."
The school is offering counseling and support resources, including grief counselors, to affected students.
In a story posted on its Instagram account, Students for Justice in Palestine said they had been "attacked" by police, surrounded and trapped.
Boston police said no protesters were injured though four officers sustained non-life-threatening injuries, three minor and one more serious, NBC News reported.
Emerson is one of many universities dealing with pro-Palestinian encampments on school grounds with police being mobilized to make arrests. More than 100 were detained at Columbia University last week when they, too, refused to leave an encampment.
The protests are in solidarity with the Palestinian people, sparked by the ongoing war between Israel and Iran-backed Hamas in Gaza which has a death toll of more than 34,000.
Demands from the protesters often call on the schools to divest from companies linked to the Israeli government.
President Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has called the protests anti-Semitic.
"What's happening in America's college campuses is horrific," he said Thursday in a recorded statement published to his social media accounts.
"Anti-Semitic mobs have taken over leading universities. They call for the annihilation of Israel. They attack Jewish students. They attacked Jewish faculty. This is reminiscent of what happened in German universities in the 1930s," he said.
"It's unconscionable. It has to be stopped."
Amidst the protests, the schools have struggled to support freedom of speech principles while upholding their by-laws and those of the cities they are in.
Many of the schools have requested police assistance.
In Georgia, at least 28 protesters were arrested at Emory University, Vice President for Public Safety Cheryl Elliott said.
The Georgia Department of Public Safety said in a statement that its assistance was requested at about 8:30 a.m. Thursday to deal with an encampment protest at Emory.
As troopers were breaking up the encampment, at least one protester threw bottles at them and refused to leave, it said, adding that at least one protester resisted arrest, requiring the use of a taser to restrain the subject.
"During the encampment protest response, troopers deployed pepper balls to control the unruly crowd but did not use tear gas," it said.
A group of Georgia Democratic lawmakers has expressed concern over the police presence and reports of excessive use of force.
"State leaders have created an environment where state police feel free -- or perhaps are directed -- to respond to normal peaceful protests with violence," they said in the letter.
"We cannot allow this dangerous repression to continue."
