0:00:00: Hundreds of pro-Palestinian protesters gathered at the building hosting the annual White House

0:00:05: Correspondents Association dinner in Washington where President Biden was giving a speech.

0:00:11: Some wearing vests with the names of Palestinian journalists killed in Gaza laid down on the

0:00:16: ground in front of the venue as guests filed in.

0:00:19: More than 20 Palestinian journalists this week issued an open letter urging their American

0:00:25: colleagues to boycott the dinner.

0:00:28: Meanwhile, police moved in on a pro-Palestinian protest at Northeastern University in Boston.

0:00:35: Officials said about 100 people were detained as they were taken away from the site.

0:00:40: Those with student identification will not face any legal action.

0:00:45: It is the latest standoff in a wave of pro-Palestinian sit-ins at campuses around the United States,

0:00:52: including this demonstration which has been ongoing at Columbia University in New York

0:00:57: for one week now.

0:00:59: Our North America correspondent Will Vernon is following developments from Washington.

0:01:03: There have also been arrests today at Indiana State University, 69 people we understand

0:01:09: detained there.

0:01:10: At Indiana University too.

0:01:13: And negotiations are ongoing at Columbia University in New York over the protest camp there.

0:01:19: And that's what really sparked this latest escalation in the protests really.

0:01:26: Pro-Palestinian demonstrations have been going on for several months now at a number

0:01:29: of universities.

0:01:30: But the moods really changed in the last week or so.

0:01:33: And that was because of an incident at Columbia.

0:01:36: On the 18th of April, the NYPD were called onto the campus to take down a protest camp

0:01:42: there.

0:01:43: Dozens of people were arrested.

0:01:45: And that really ignited tensions.

0:01:49: And a number of other protest camps were then pitched at various universities across the

0:01:55: country.

0:01:56: Now, the protesters say that they're unhappy with the U.S. government's support for the

0:02:00: Israeli military campaign.

0:02:02: They want a ceasefire in Gaza.

0:02:04: But also they're demanding that their universities divest, so cut ties with companies with links

0:02:11: to Israel.

0:02:13: But many Jewish students say that they feel intimidated by these demos.

0:02:17: There have been a number of reports of verbal assaults or even physical attacks on Jewish

0:02:22: people by the pro-Palestinian demonstrators.

0:02:25: The Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, as well as many people in Congress here, say

0:02:30: that these protests are anti-Semitic.

0:02:32: Of course, the demonstrators deny that.

0:02:35: And university administrators say that a lot of this trouble is being caused by radical

0:02:40: outside elements that have infiltrated the ranks of the students.

0:02:44: And that's certainly what we heard from Northeastern earlier today.

0:02:46: They told us that, whilst around 100 were detained, only about 12 or maybe a bit more

0:02:52: than that of them actually had student IDs.

0:02:55: So many of them were not from the university at all.