As students return to Columbia, the epicenter of a campus protest movement braces for disruption [Video]

As Columbia University resumes classes Tuesday, students and faculty are planning, and bracing, for a resumption of the pro-Palestinian protests that convulsed the Manhattan campus at the tail end of the spring semester and touched off a wave of college demonstrations nationwide.In recent weeks, the university’s new leadership has embarked on listening sessions aimed at cooling tensions, released a report on campus antisemitism and circulated new protest guidelines meant to limit disruption. But student organizers are undeterred, promising to ramp up their actions — including possible encampments — until the university agrees to cut ties with companies linked to Israel.“As long as Columbia continues to invest and to benefit from Israeli apartheid, the students will continue to resist,” said Mahmoud Khalil, a graduate student who represented campus protesters in negotiations with the university. “Not only protests and encampments, the limit is the sky.”The start to the school year comes less …