A group of antiwar protesters rallied at Boston's Emerson College Wednesday afternoon.
The pro-Palestinian protest near Boston Common has been peaceful. The group of dozens of people marched through Boylston Place Alley, a public way on the Emerson Campus, where more than 100 people were arrested last week as Boston police broke up an encampment.
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Emerson is one of dozens of schools where students and others have protested Israel's ongoing war in Gaza.
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The group crossed the street and set up outside an entrance to the MBTA Green Line for several minutes before moving across the street, where they were attaching sticky notes on a building's window.
MBTA General Manager Phillip Eng said he was monitoring the situation: "Transit police is on top of it right now. I understand it's peaceful, there’s no impact to service."
A Boston police representative said the department was aware of the ongoing protest.
Student journalist Hannah Nguyen documented the rally on social media as it developed Wednesday afternoon.
Another protest took place at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which announced that police in Cambridge had closed Massachusetts Avenue between Memorial Drive and Vassar Street.
Aerial footage showed a group of protesters in a park.
Earlier in the day, about 30 Emerson students appeared in Boston Municipal Court to be arraigned over the encampment arrests last week. With fellow students in attendance, they took deals to complete 40 hours of community service.
The rally comes hours after police in riot gear broke up an encampment at Columbia University and cleared a dormitory that protesters had occupied.
Universities nationwide are on edge as encampments continue to take over lawns, just weeks ahead of graduation. Student protesters at two other Boston schools were facing a new ultimatum if their demonstrations don't come to an end soon.
Tufts University President Sunil Kumar called for an end to the on-campus encampment, led by Tufts Students for Justice in Palestine. The group says they are being peaceful.
The students told NBC10 Boston they were issued a no trespass order from the university. Those who don't comply could be subject to disciplinary action. For seniors, it could mean no graduation ceremony.
Kumar on Wednesday met leaders of the protest "in the spirit of exploring every path possible for a peaceful and voluntary resolution and a successful Commencement for our graduates and their loved ones," a university representative said in a statement.
At MIT, the president said the protesters on their campus are violating school policies: "This particular form of expression needs to end soon."
She has acknowledged that the protests have been peaceful but said some of the chants the students are saying can be perceived as calling for the elimination of the state of Israel.
Some MIT faculty members say the administration plans to act within the next 48 hours.
Students at Tufts and MIT said Wednesday they were not afraid of a potential police raid.
"A very important aspect of the student movement — what people are calling the student intifada — is to standup against that state violence, is for us to come together and show that that state violence– that the threat of state violence cannot scare us," said an MIT grad student who gave his name as Prahlad.
In Providence, Rhode Island, tents were cleared from Brown University’s Main Green, NBC affiliate WJAR reported.
Gaza Solidarity Encampment told WJAR that Brown and demonstrators reached an agreement.
"The pressure of us being, staying on the Green, staying here saying we will not move until you listen to our demands really forced [the school's president] to take action," a spokesperson for the group to WJAR. "That's something that encampments and students across the country should be noticing is that it's working. They're listening."
As part of the deal, protests and encampments aren't allowed for the remainder of the academic year, according to WJAR, including during reunion weekend and commencement.
Student protesters who received conduct violations don't have to accept them but will remain on probation.
Over in Hanover, New Hampshire, Dartmouth College students will be setting up tents Wednesday, according to NBC affiliate WPTZ.
The Dartmouth New Deal Coalition said they will form an encampment at about 6:30 p.m. in solidarity with the other protests occurring at universities across the U.S.
This will be the first large-scale encampment at a New Hampshire college campus, reports WPTZ.
Meanwhile, in Vermont, encampments were formed earlier this week at the University of Vermont and Middlebury College.
