Teenage Columbia Protester — Daughter of a ‘Batman’ Star, Maggie Gyllenhaal, and Niece of Jake Gyllenhaal — Arrested at Unruly Anti-Israel Protest
Meanwhile, Columbia is doling out suspensions to those involved in the violent demonstration.
The 18-year-old daughter of an A-list actress, Maggie Gyllenhaal, was one of the nearly 80 Columbia University students arrested this week for overtaking the school’s historic library to stage an anti-Israel protest while their fellow students were studying for exams.
Ramona Sarsgaard, who is the oldest daughter of Ms. Gyllenhaal, star of “Batman: The Dark Knight,” and the actor Peter Sarsgaard, co-star of “The Batman,” was handed a desk appearance ticket for criminal trespassing, the New York Post reported.
Ms. Sarsgaard’s actress mother, who has been nominated for two Academy Awards, attended Columbia, as did Ms. Gyllenhaal’s brother, Jake, a major Hollywood star most recently seen in Amazon’s hit reboot of “Road House.” The actors’ parents both attended Columbia as well.
Ms. Gyllenhaal is of Ashkenazi Jewish descent and Mr. Saarsgard was raised Catholic. Of Ramona, her mother told People magazine in 2021 that “she’s going to be a Supreme Court justice,” before adding, “I’m kidding — but she’s an incredible student.”
Ms. Gyllenhaal described her daughter as “a real environmental activist.” She noted that Ramona, “like many, many children, isn’t able to push out of her mind the dire situation that we’re in.”
The protest erupted Wednesday afternoon when an estimated 100 activists affiliated with Columbia University Apartheid Divest stormed Columbia’s Lawrence A. Wein Reading Room, where students were studying for exams, and transformed it into a “Liberated Zone.” Videos of the protest shared online show the keffiyeh-clad students chanting anti-Israel slogans and vandalizing the library’s shelves with messages like, “COLUMBIA WILL BURN 4 THE MARTYRS.”
The student group behind the protest, Columbia University Apartheid Divest, has been behind some of the most virulent anti-Israel campus protests in the country and is open on Instagram about its embrace of violent resistance to the supposed evils of the West. Not only does the student group advocate for violent resistance against Zionism, but it has also professed its goal of “fighting for the total eradication of Western civilization.”
Columbia is one of the only top-level undergraduate programs in the country to require Western civilization courses as part of its legendary Core Curriculum.
As the demonstration continued, the anti-Israel protesters clashed with public safety officers who instructed them to provide ID and leave the library or face arrest. The acting university president, Claire Shipman, eventually authorized the New York Police Department to enter the building and at least 75 protesters were arrested. Two university security officers were injured during the standoff.
The incident marks the largest mass arrest on Columbia’s campus since 109 protestors were detained last April for violently overtaking Hamilton Hall. As a result of the protest, at least 65 student agitators have been handed suspensions, Columbia University officials reported. It’s not clear yet whether Ms. Sarsgaard, who is set to graduate from Columbia in 2028, faces the same punishment.
