However, the night before the protest was scheduled, organisers received notice that Lobby 7 was no longer a space that could be used to hold demonstrations on campus.
"If you're visiting MIT for the first time, and you walk in the
building, [Lobby 7]'s where you go, it's a very famous and historic
place to hold protests," Francesca Riccio-Ackerman, a PhD student at
MIT, told Middle East Eye.
"So for MIT, the night before, to send out communication saying 'by
the way, you're no longer allowed to protest in Lobby 7, and if you do,
you're breaking MIT policy', was a shady move."
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At US universities, free speech isn't free for pro-Palestine activists
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Riccio-Ackerman said that the move to send the notice appeared to be
"intentionally trying to automatically cast anyone who participates in
any kind of action as breaking institutional policy".
Because of the last-minute nature of the notice, the demonstrators
decided to continue on with the protest. In the first few hours of the
protest, which began at 8am, counterprotesters showed up, some with
Israeli flags and posters, setting off a series of altercations between
the two groups.
Riccio-Ackerman, who had documented the protests throughout the day
on X, shared videos of the demonstration showing counterprotesters
putting posters in the face of students, and one person physically
breaking through a picket line.
After 11am, a leaflet was being passed around by the administration
called on all demonstrators to leave Lobby 7 or be faced with
suspension. Yet, the protesters remained throughout the afternoon and
evening, despite a lockdown of the area instituted by police later in
the evening.
"It was just such a beautiful show of solidarity to see so many
people from all walks of life supporting Palestine," one student, who
asked to remain anonymous, told MEE.
Likewise, Professor Nasser Rabbat, from the Department of
Architecture at MIT, told MEE that in the few hours he was present
during the protest, he found the event to be "peaceful, even cheerful".
Were Jewish students blocked from attending classes?
Since the events of 9 November, pro-Palestine protesters have been serially accused by pro-Israel students of having "physically prevented" Jewish and Israeli students from attending class.
Retsef Levi, a professor at MIT, also amplified their claim
in a now viral thread that also described Jewish students as remaining
in their dorms in fear and over concerns MIT was no longer safe for
Jews.
However, there is no evidence that shows any student, Jewish, Israeli
or otherwise, being physically blocked or hindered from attending
class.
Video evidence suggests that not only were pathways provided to
students in Lobby 7, as the protest went on, but it was
counterprotesters who had deliberately attempted to disrupt the rally
inside the building.
Footage shared with Middle East Eye, for instance, shows a
counterprotester physically breaking the protesters' picket line when
there appeared to be ample space for him to walk around the
demonstrators.
Another video showed a counterprotester breaking through a police line and shoving a pro-Palestine protester to the ground.
In a private exchange on
13 November with the MIT Israel Alliance (MITIA), later shared online
by the group, MIT President Sally Kornbluth said: "It's been falsely
rumored that Jewish students were prevented from attending class."
"While we recognise a heightened sensitivity given the increase in
reports of antisemitism around the country and in greater Boston, we
have received no evidence of any kind that Jewish students, or anyone
else, were prevented from attending class," Kornbluth added.
But then the next day, Kornbluth said in a statement
that there was "a specific unease about passing through Lobby 7" though
"it is not accurate that movement around the MIT campus is
constrained".
That statement, however, was later updated to
say there were moments where "some students were impeding access to the
Infinite Corridor" and that, given the loud nature of the
demonstration, "it is no surprise that some students felt afraid of
passing through Lobby 7".
Levi, the professor who posted the viral thread, told MEE that this
new statement from the "MIT president confirm[ed] that the reports of
Jewish students being impeded from going to class are in fact true, and
consistent with the student letter I posted on Twitter on Nov[ember]
10".
MIT would not comment on the contents of the letter to MITIA or what
evidence had come to light a day later to warrant the new statement.
Students present at the demonstration who spoke to MEE said they were
growing increasingly frustrated with the lack of transparency at MIT
and were appalled at the ongoing efforts by the administration to modify
their statements to fit their narrative.
In response to MEE's request for comment, MIT's media relations
director, Kimberly Allen, said: "MIT leaders are working hard - with
students, faculty and staff - to ensure everyone feels safe and able to
focus on their classes, their research, and their work solving the
world's toughest scientific problems."
War of narratives
After the Lobby 7 protest, the MIT Israel Alliance penned a letter to
the administration in which it claimed that pro-Palestine students had
periodically engaged in antisemitic harassment and hate speech towards
Jewish and Israeli students.
But the letter, reviewed by MEE, essentially just makes reference to
pro-Palestine chants, slogans and statements criticising Israeli
government policy. It also called for MIT to adopt the International
Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, which
equates antisemitism with criticism of Zionism or Israel.
Soon, the MIT Israel Alliance was on CNN and Fox News repeating the unsubstantiated claims that Jewish students are no longer safe on campus.
In response to the MIT Israel Alliance, Jews For Ceasefire, a group
of Jewish and Israeli students at the university, penned a letter of
their own urging the administration to refute the IHRA definition of
antisemitism.
"MITIA is now attempting to spin the protest to suit their own
narrative - that of uninformed or hateful supporters of Palestine
against peace-seeking Jews," the letter stated.
"MITIA speaks as if they stand for all Jews and Israelis at MIT but
we are here together to call out this blatant lie. They do not represent
us, they do not speak for us."
MEE asked MITIA about whether it considers itself as representative
of the entire Jewish and Israeli community, given that there were
several Jewish students that both participated in the pro-Palestine
protest and opposed the endorsement of the IHRA definition.
MITIA did not respond to MEE's multiple requests for comment.
"They started pushing out a bunch of media, without verifying claims,
while ignoring evidence that is out there," Ricco-Ackerman, the PhD
student at MIT tracking the developments at the university, said.
"And [they] went on CNN and just pretty much are given the platform
to say, publish and distribute anything that they want to say, without
verification," she added.
Students, faculty, alumni push back
As it stands, the student-led Coalition Against Apartheid (CAA) group
said it was recently notified that it was under investigation for
breaking university policy during its decision to go ahead with the
protest in Lobby 7.
"The possibility of suspension of CAA as a club is one of the
potential outcomes that could come up," Ogundipe, president of CAA,
said.
Yet for student organisers like Ogundipe, such an outcome wouldn't be the end of their work.
She said that CAA has already received assurances from other student
groups on campus that they can pile their resources, including the
ability to reserve rooms and locations on campus, and use them to help
push for demonstrations and events around Palestine.
'An attack on one of us, is an attack on all of us'
- MIT student groups in support of CAA
The war on Gaza that began more than a month ago has killed nearly 15,000 Palestinians, according to latest data.
Around 1,2oo Israelis were killed during the initial Hamas-led assualt on Israel 7 October.
In just the first few weeks, Israel dropped 6,000 bombs on Gaza.
Hundreds of scholars have warned that Israel may be committing genocide
against Palestinians in the enclave.
Meanwhile, support for CAA from students, faculty and alumni have
poured in. Several other student groups including Palestine @ MIT, the
Black Students Union, the Asian American Initiative, the Arab Student
Organization, Reading for Revolution and others said in a statement: "An attack on one of us, is an attack on all of us."
A group of faculty also penned a letter in support of the 9 November demonstration. And nearly 400 MIT alumni have signed
an open letter to the administration threatening to withhold
contributions to the university if it does not apologise for the "hasty
and harmful response" to the demonstration, which included the threat of
suspension levied against students.
"Alumni saw the media that circulated in the aftermath of the sit-in,
portraying the peaceful demonstration as a threat to the physical
safety of others. We, along with members of the MIT faculty, found this
narrative at odds with what happened," the letter stated, urging the
university to not fall under pressure from "politically motivated
actors".
"We morally balk at a Palestine-exception to free speech, and we call
on MIT to strive to create an environment where all community members
can voice their concerns."
Several students that MEE spoke to for this story, who have been a
part of the demonstrations, said that while the climate on campus is
quite tense, they don't feel any fear while going about their daily
activities.
And despite developments across the country where students may face
risks to their future careers over speaking up on Palestine, many of the
students are not swayed by those threats.
"There's a range of ways that we as students kind of think about
these things because we're all operating on different levels of risk,"
said Ogundipe.
"There's this general aura of like, I would not want to work at a job
that would ask me to compromise on any of these sorts of principles."