News Wrap: Israel-Hamas war protests continue on campuses while some are shut down

John Yang:

Good evening. I'm John Yang. Today, some universities move to shut down protests over the Israel-Hamas war, as students at other schools dug in and vowed to keep their demonstrations going. In Northeastern University in Boston, officers in riot gear cleared an encampment without incident and arrested more than 100 protesters for trespassing and disorderly conduct.

School officials said what they called professional organizers had infiltrated the demonstration and that antisemitic slurs had been used. Students disputed all that and said the slurs came from what they called counter protesters. At other schools, including the University of Pittsburgh, students and they intended to keep their peaceful demonstrations going at least until Monday.

At Columbia University, students pressed their demand that the school divested from corporations and institutions they say support Israel.

Woman:

You have the power to end this tomorrow, and the things that we need from you as students is real, intentional commitment to the demands we have placed on the table.

John Yang:

Late Friday, Columbia's policymaking body voted to investigate the school administration, saying students' rights had been violated. And Columbia banned a student protester from campus for antisemitic comments he made in an online video. The student has since said he was wrong.

In the Israel-Hamas war, Israeli airstrikes on southern Gaza have killed at least 13 people, four of them children. A separate strike in a central Gaza refugee camp killed five people. Israel says Hamas uses residential areas to shield militants.

Efforts continue for a hostage and ceasefire deal with Hamas in order to avert a promised Israeli ground invasion of Rafah.

Residents in parts of Nebraska and Iowa are sifting through the aftermath of a tornado outbreak. Videos posted on social media show twisters churning up debris on Friday as they crossed fields, highways, and towns.

There were reports of several injuries, but no deaths. There's a threat of tornadoes again tonight in Nebraska, as well as in Texas and Oklahoma. And disgraced movie producer Harvey Weinstein is in a New York City hospital tonight for tests. Weinstein, whose sex abuse case helped kick off the Me Too movement, had been sent to Rikers Island in New York City from his upstate prison ahead of a court appearance.

His 2020 rape conviction in New York was tossed out this week by an Appeals Court and a new trial ordered. His conviction in a similar case in California still stands.

Still to come on PBS News, why once peaceful Ecuador is now a center of drug fueled violence. And a new book investigates the landscape of climate change from a to z.