BREAKING: Columbia faculty stage walkout in support of student Gaza Camp on campus

Columbia University faculty joined students on Monday in staging a walkout. The faculty were opposing the university administration's use of the NYPD to arrest occupying students who have set up a Gaza Camp in the campus quad. 

Professors stood in their robes and addressed the students. 

Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar's daughter Isra Hirsi was among those protesters. As a result of her actions, she was suspended from Columbia's sister school Barnard and was arrested by the NYPD as well. Omar supported the students, saying: 

"On Thursday, Columbia arrested and suspended its students who were peacefully protesting and have now ignited a nationwide Gaza Solidarity movement. This is more than the students hoped for and I am glad to see this type of solidarity. But to be clear, this about the genocide in Gaza and the attention has to remain on that." 

Omar put out a statement in favor of the protesters, as well, claiming that those who detracted from their cause or their actions were "co-opting" the protests. 

"Throughout history, protests were co-opted and made to look bad so police and public leaders would shut them down," she said, claiming that the protesters were being vilified.  

Columbia law school professors also sent a letter to the administration condemning the school for arresting and suspending students who engaged in anti-Israel, anti-Jewish protests.  

“While we as a faculty disagree about the relevant political issues and express no opinion on the merits of the protest, we are writing to urge respect for basic rule-of-law values that ought to govern our University,” the letter read. 

It went on to say that "the justifications for the suspensions and arrests that the University has provided are that the student encampment violated unspecified 'new policies,' 'severely disrupt[ed] campus life,' and 'create[d] a harassing and intimidating environment for many of our students." The professors allege that there's no "public information about the rules invoked, processes used, and facts found to support the blanket suspension of over one hundred students." 

The law professors said that the administration's handling of the protests "threaten the University's legitimacy within its own community and beyond its gates." 

Architecture professors also ran to the aid of the students' cause, saying that they "condemn in the strongest possible terms the Administration's suspension of students who engaged in peaceful protest and their arrest by the New York City Police Department." 

They claimed that the "acts violate the letter and the spirit of University Statutes, shared governance, students' rights, and the University's absolute obligation to defend students' freedom of speech and to ensure their safety." 

Like the law professors, they did not mention the rights of Jewish students on campus to not face harassment or intimidation.