Columbia extends negotiations with pro-Palestine protesters as Mike Johnson visits campus: Live

On Tuesday, the UN released a report saying inspectors found “mass graves” in Gaza, some of which were allegedly filled with the elderly, the wounded, and women. Some of the Palestinians buried in the mass graves appeared to have had their hands tied before they were killed.

Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez called out the press for giving ample air time to cover ongoing campus protests — a topic that is quickly spiraling into a culture war flash point — rather than zeroing in on the discovery of the mass graves.

House Speaker Mike Johnson has called for Columbia University President Minouche Shafik to resign, accusing her of being “weak” and “inept” in her handling of the ongoing protests at the university.

Mr Johnson appeared on the Hugh Hewitt radio show on Wednesday, saying that during a visit to the campus later today he planned to join “with some of my colleagues from the House Republicans from New York to call on the president of the university to resign.”

“This President Shafik has shown to be a very weak, inept leader. They cannot even guarantee the safety of Jewish students? They are expected to run for their lives and stay home from class? It’s maddening,” Mr Johnson said, per Fox News. “What we are seeing on these college campuses across the country is disgusting and unacceptable and every leader in this country, every political official, every citizen of good conscience has to speak out and say that ‘this is not who we are in America.’ And we got to have accountability and that is what my colleagues and I will be working on.”

Earlier this year Mr Johnson pushed to have the faces of Capitol rioters caught on video blurred when the footage is released to the public “in order to protect the innocent,” and he previously insinuated that some of the rioters were just visitors taking a walk in the Capitol.

“I made a commitment immediately after I got the gavel that we would start releasing that,” Mr Johnson said in April, referencing the Capitol riot footage. “Originally we were trying to blur some of the faces to protect the innocent, you know, people who were there and just happened to be walking through the building.”

New York Mayor Eric Adams insinuated that the protest happening at colleges and universities in New York City may be connected by an outside influence.

“People who peacefully protest for an issue, they’re not throwing bottles and chairs,” Mr Adams said. “There are people who come, they have nothing to do with an issue and they want to aggravate.”

There is no factual evidence to support the idea that an outside influence is infiltrating college or university pro-Palestinian protests in order to make them more aggressive.

But Mr Adams offered some possible evidence to his theory: “Why is everybody’s tent the same?” he said. “Was there a fire sale on these things?”

He wasn’t the only one to make that observation; far-right Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene and Ian Michael Cheong, a Malaysian man who blogs about conservative politics in the US, both hinted at some kind of conspiracy concerning the tents.

Students at Brown University have begun a protest encampment on their campus in solidarity with Palestinians as well as other college and university students.

In a social media post, the students have asked Brown University to divest its endowment from companies “profiting from the genocide in Gaza and the broader Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory.”

They’ve also asked the university to drop charges against the 41 students arrested in December for a sit-in and end the university’s use of the criminal justice system to penalize student protests.

At least 100 people were arrested during a pro-Palestine protest near Chuck Schumer’s home in Brooklyn last night.

On the second night of Passover, a massive group of people, organized by Jewish Voice for Peace, gathered near Prospect Park to call for a ceasefire in Gaza. The protesters, wearing shirts that read “Jews Say Cease-Fire Now” laid out a large circular banner showing foods that would appear at a Seder.

Signs reading “Stop Starving Gaza” and “Stop Funding Genocide” appeared in the large crowd.

The protest arrived just after hundreds of people were arrested at New York University and Columbia University for setting up protest encampments in protest of the school’s financial ties to the war in Gaza.

But more arrests were in store after the protest blocked traffic.

The Independent has reached out to the NYPD for comment.

Representative Nancy Pelosi, the former speaker of the house, said on Monday that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should “resign” as Israel faces mounting criticisms for it’s handling of the war in Gaza.

In response to Hamas’ October 7 attack on Israel, the country has waged an aggressive campaign to eliminate Hamas, killing thousands of innocent Palestinians and contributing to a humanitarian crisis in the process.

“He should resign. He’s ultimately responsible,” Ms Pelosi said.

The representative questioned Mr Netanyahu’s view on peace and a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine.

The US Senate, on Tuesday evening, finally sent a three-pronged aid package with military assistance for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan to President Joe Biden’s desk, ending months of delays that administration officials and top brass were increasingly blaming for Ukrainian battlefield casualties.

Senators voted 79-18 for the aid package in a largely bipartisan fashion.

Three pieces of legislation that were part of the national security supplemental passed by the Senate, as well as one piece of sidecar legislation dealing with Russia/Iran sanctions, passed the House on Saturday. Combined, they will provide tens of billions of dollars in security and military assistance to US allies in three regions.

Much of the $26.38bn Israel bill is centred around restocking Israeli munitions required for its defences as well as the siege of Gaza, where Israel is attempting to wipe out Hamas militants. $4bn is included for resupplying the Iron Dome defensive grid, and $1.2bn is include for the so-called “Iron Beam”, a ground-based laser system used to take out drones and missiles.

$3.5bn is set aside to help Israel procure weapon systems, while nearly $7bn is marked for restocking US supplies and funding operations in the region.

But some Democrats expressed disappointment at not being able to have amendments to hold Israel accountable as its military campaign in Gaza after the October 7 attack has led to 34,000 deaths. Independent Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont had proposed amendments to restore funding to United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) and require Israel not receive unfettered assistance.

“I think it’s beyond belief that, on an issue where the majority of the American people don’t want to continue to support Netanyahu’s war machine slaughter of women and children in Gaza, that we couldn’t even get an amendment to deal with that,” he toldThe Independent earlier in the day.

Mr Sanders’s colleague from Vermont Senator Peter Welch, who supports a ceasefire in Gaza, said that the Senate needed to vote.

“I would have preferred that we have separate votes on each of the items like the House did,” he said, but added that he thought Mr Biden was concerned about reducing civilian casualties.

Speaker of the House Mike Johnson is set to meet with Jewish students at Columbia University today and deliver remarks about the rise of antisemitism on college campuses.

New York Mayor Eric Adams insinuated that the protest happening at colleges and universities in New York City may be connected by an outside influence.

“People who peacefully protest for an issue, they’re not throwing bottles and chairs,” Mr Adams said. “There are people who come, they have nothing to do with an issue and they want to aggravate.”

There is no factual evidence to support the idea that an outside influence is infiltrating college or university pro-Palestinian protests in order to make them more aggressive.

But Mr Adams offered some possible evidence to his theory: “Why is everybody’s tent the same?” he said. “Was there a fire sale on these things?”