A cluster of tents sits in a patch of grass directly in front of Vanderbilt University’s Kirkland Hall, a campus flashpoint where protests last month led to the arrest of a local reporter and criminal charges against four students. Some of the tents are draped in the Palestinian flag. Another has a large banner declaring Vanderbilt “#1 in Student Suppression.” Amidst the tents on Thursday morning, two Vanderbilt students, both women of color, sat in folding chairs, occupying the encampment while studying for final exams.
Vanderbilt officials — with Chancellor Daniel Diermeier chief among them — were already under scrutiny when their reaction to the student demonstrations in March earned them widespread condemnation, including from faculty. Now, a student occupation of the area just outside the school’s landmark building, which houses administrative offices, is entering its second month. A surveillance camera aimed at the tents sits conspicuously about halfway up the face of the building, where there was none just several weeks ago.
This encampment is just one of dozens that have cropped up on college campuses across the country in response to Israel’s catastrophic military assault on Gaza, and the U.S. government’s ongoing support for Israel. And they have only grown in size and number as university officials enlist law enforcement to crack down on student demonstrators. Students at Vanderbilt and elsewhere also have been calling on university leaders to end their financial entanglements with Israel and Israeli companies. Advocates have also highlighted Vanderbilt’s relationship with Israeli universities through study abroad programs.
How we got here
Vanderbilt students taking a shift at the encampment Thursday told the Banner that they were there because they don’t want what’s happening in Gaza to blend into the background hum of everyday news.
“I was just a little bit tired of the apathy on campus,” one of the students, a sophomore who declined to share her name, told the Banner. “It felt like no one cared.”
Israel launched a siege of the small Palestinian territory after Hamas militants broke through Israel’s borders on Oct. 7, attacking concertgoers at a music festival and attacking Israeli communities. According to Israeli authorities, the militants killed around 1,200 people and took some 250 hostages – 130 of whom are believed to still be held by Hamas in Gaza. For more than six months since, the Israeli military has conducted a relentless bombardment of Gaza. The United Nations, citing the Gaza Ministry of Health, says that more than 34,000 Palestinians have been killed. A U.N. relief agency says around 1.7 million Palestinians have been displaced, and the World Food Programme estimates 1.1 million are facing “catastrophe levels of hunger.” The International Court of Justice found in January that it is “plausible” Israel is committing genocide.
Nevertheless, this week, President Joe Biden signed new legislation authorizing military aid to Ukraine and Israel, among other nations. The package includes $26 billion in aid for Israel compared to $1 billion in humanitarian aid for Palestinians in Gaza.
A series of student actions on campus
In March, Vanderbilt officials blocked the student government from voting on a Boycott, Divest and Sanction (BDS) resolution. In response, 27 students entered Kirkland Hall and conducted a sit-in for nearly 24-hours before they were forcibly removed by Vanderbilt police. Three of the protesting students were charged with misdemeanor assault — for allegedly shoving a Community Service Officer and a university staffer as they entered the building — and a fourth was charged with vandalism. University police also arrested Nashville Scene reporter Eli Motycka who had been covering the demonstrations, although he was later released without charges. The school’s campus newspaper, the Vanderbilt Hustler, reported that three students since have been expelled by the school, with 22 others facing disciplinary probation.
The sit-in at Kirkland Hall is what prompted Vanderbilt junior Helena Spigner to start sleeping on the ground outside of the building, first with a sleeping bag on concrete while friends of hers were inside. She told the Banner that she’s spent more than half of the past 31 nights at the encampment.
“When I found out what had happened [on Oct. 7], I heard the rhetoric going around about who was the ‘terrorist’ and who was saying those things. I said, ‘OK, well America seems to be on the side of Israel, let me see what’s really going on here,’” she said. “As an African-American History major here, I have a lot of understanding of who gets to develop the narrative and what that looks like in terms of the minorities and marginalized people. So when I did my research I found out more of the history of the land and what was happening and instantly was like, I am going to advocate for Palestine here, because I see who is being subjugated.”
As the two students were sitting at the encampment on Thursday, Sofia Huang, a university staff member from the school’s counseling center, approached the encampment.
“I’ve always been a pro-Palestinian [person],” Huang told the Banner. “I haven’t been involved in Nashville unfortunately as much because I’m working full-time and I’m trying to graduate and defend my dissertation in a week. So I just wanted to come out and see how I could support in whatever way possible.”
Spigner, who is a member of the Vanderbilt Divest Coalition, explained their demands: reinstate students who were expelled or suspended after last month’s protest; and allow the student government to vote on the resolution calling for student organizations to divest from and boycott “any companies that help fund the genocide happening in Palestine.” Tennessee law prohibits the state or any other public entity from contracting with companies or organizations that are boycotting Israel. Vanderbilt officials have cited that law, and the fact that the school contracts with the state, in response to calls for the university to divest from Israel. But student BDS advocates have argued that the school’s student government would be exempted from the law based on certain provisions.
Regardless of their ability to affect changes in Vanderbilt’s investment portfolio and business relationships, though, the students sleeping outside Kirkland Hall said they have a broader aim.
“Another big thing is ending the normalization of what’s happening in Palestine. At Vanderbilt it seems to be kind of normal now,” Spigner said. “People have stopped talking about it and our goal is to just keep that conversation going and say this is not normal, we need to end a genocide. Genocides are not just a part of everyday life.”