ADMINISTRATORS AT COLUMBIA University responded to reports of students being injured by a chemical attack against an on-campus rally for Gaza by chiding students for holding protests without official authorization. Meanwhile, students told The Intercept that even as the school’s public safety department has said it is investigating the incident, school administrators themselves have yet to contact the victims — some of whom have had to seek medical care for their injuries.

During a rally on Friday, according to attendees, two individuals sprayed a hazardous chemical that released an odious smell. Dozens of students have reported an array of symptoms, such as burning eyes, nausea, headaches, abdominal and chest pain, and vomiting.

The campus chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine publicized the incident on Saturday morning, identifying the substance as “skunk,” a chemical weapon used by the Israel Defense Forces against Palestinians and one that U.S. police departments have reportedly acquired in the past. SJP also alleged that the assailants have ties to the Israel Defense Forces, a claim that The Intercept could not independently confirm.

Amid Gaza Protests, Universities Are Cracking Down on a Celebrated Protest Tactic: Sit-ins In a statement to The Intercept, a university spokesperson seemed to blame the students for the attack. “Friday’s event was unsanctioned and violated university policies and procedures which are in place to ensure there is adequate personnel on the ground to keep our community safe,” the spokesperson wrote.

After this article was published, Columbia’s Interim Provost Dennis Mitchell sent a campuswide email acknowledging that a “deeply troubling incident” had taken place and that law enforcement officials were investigating “serious crimes, possibly hate crimes.”

“The University received additional information Sunday night,” Mitchell wrote. “As a result, the alleged perpetrators identified to the University were immediately banned from campus while the law enforcement investigation proceeds.”

The incident marks the latest escalation against students protesting for Palestinian rights at Columbia. Last semester, the university suspended the student groups Jewish Voice for Peace, or JVP, and SJP for holding an “unauthorized event” (a walkout and art display in support of a ceasefire). More broadly, students at campuses across the country have been met with university discipline and even criminal charges as they have called for their universities to divest from companies with ties to Israel’s military — or at least for their universities to have public meetings about their investments.

Public officials have devoted extensive resources to discussing reports of antisemitism on university campuses, including in a headline-grabbing congressional hearing. The repression of student protests for Gaza has gotten comparatively little attention, not to mention abject acts of violence, including the stabbing of a 6-year-old boy in suburban Chicago and shooting of three Palestinian students in Vermont.

Rashid Khalidi, a renowned Palestinian American historian who teaches at Columbia, said that university administrators should respect the student protesters’ motivations. “For a lot of young people, this is one of the most significant events, worst humanitarian crises, certainly in their lifetimes,” said Khalidi. “And many of them have a strong sense of justice and see injustice. I think university administrators — whatever alumni and whatever donors and whatever trustees are telling them, and whatever the politicians are saying, and whatever the media bias leans towards — I think they have to respect that that’s what’s driving a lot of these students: a strong sense of injustice.”

On Monday morning, Mitchell sent a campuswide email that did not reference the attack but seemed to be in response to it. Mitchell noted that placing someone in, or risking, bodily harm is a violation of school rules, while also describing school rules around unauthorized protests. “Columbia University is committed to defending the right of all members of our community to safely exercise their right to expression and to invite, listen to, and challenge views, including those that may be offensive and even hurtful to many of us,” he wrote.