A pro-Palestinian U.S. group filed a federal civil rights complaint against Columbia University following last week's mass arrest of anti-war protesters after the school called police to clear demonstrator encampments, the group said on Thursday.

Palestine Legal, an organization that seeks to protect the rights of people in the U.S. to speak out on behalf of Palestinians, urged the U.S. Education Department to probe the school's actions, which it alleges were discriminatory against those who are pro-Palestinian.

Columbia University declined to comment.

Last week, the university tried to shut down campus demonstrations by force when Columbia President Minouche Shafik took the unusual move of inviting New York City police to enter the campus, drawing the ire of many human rights groups, students and faculty. More than 100 people were arrested, reminiscent of the demonstrations against the Vietnam War at Columbia more than 50 years ago.

Protests have since continued at Columbia and spread to other U.S. campuses, where hundreds have been arrested in the last week.

The demonstrators were calling for an end to the Gaza war, during which Israel has killed 34,000 people, according to Gaza's health ministry, displacing nearly all of Gaza's population and leading to widespread hunger, and genocide allegations, that Israel denies. The war has caused intense discourse, across the United States, Israel's most important ally.