Police in riot gear arrived at UCLA on Thursday afternoon in response to a new pro-Palestinian encampment that had been erected on the campus hours earlier.
At least two tents had been set up on the Kerckhoff patio Thursday morning. Wood pallets surrounding the patio marked the perimeter of the encampment. Private security and UCLA police had been on site throughout the day, apparently to keep the camp from growing, students said.
Police tape blocked off the entrance to the encampment and officers prevented people from entering the area. At one point, protesters surged past the police tape to deliver water to the site.
Campus officials warned protesters to disperse or face potential disciplinary and legal action.
“Law enforcement is prepared to arrest individuals, in accordance with applicable law,” the campus wrote in a letter to protesters. “We remain committed to supporting the safety and well-being of Bruins, supporting the free expression rights of our community, and minimizing disruption to our teaching and learning mission.”
By the afternoon, a handful of students in kaffiyehs sat outside the north end of the encampment, sharing drinks and snacks. They were there to show support for the protesters, one said. A small crowd gathered on the south end of the encampment, some holding signs that said “UAW rank & file workers for Palestine.” Protesters marched in a circle outside the nearby Mathematical Sciences Building, chanting “free Palestine.”
Classes held in the buildings surrounding the encampment were shifted online, according to a public safety alert issued to the campus.
“There is reasonable cause to find that demonstrators’ activities — including erecting barricades, establishing fortifications, and blocking access to parts of the campus and buildings — are disrupting campus operations. Demonstrators have been informed that if they do not disperse, they will face arrest and possible disciplinary action, as well as an order to stay away from campus for 7 days,” Administrative Vice Chancellor Michael Beck and Associate Vice Chancellor for Campus Safety Rick Braziel said in a statement.
The encampment comes on the same day that UCLA Chancellor Gene Block, who has led the university amid months of tense protests over the Israel-Hamas war, testified before a congressional hearing on campus antisemitism.
Block told the Republican-led House Committee on Education and the Workforce that “with the benefit of hindsight, we should have been prepared to immediately remove the encampment if and when the safety of our community was put at risk.”
Dana Kopel, a second-year PhD student at UCLA who is a supporter of Palestinian solidarity actions on campus, said the congressional inquiry is “part of the larger process in the U.S. to frame antisemitism as a means to suppress student protest and the justification for the violent suppression of student protests at UCLA and elsewhere.”
Some Jewish students on campus said they felt intimidated by the initial encampment as protesters scrawled graffiti such as “Death 2 Zionism” on campus buildings and blocked access.
Kopel said students involved in the protests have “remained steadfast” in their support for Palestine and their goal to end the bloodshed in Gaza.
“So many of these students faced such intense violence just a few weeks ago,” Kopel said. “I think that’s why there’s a real effort to communicate that the risks of this are high. The university has made it clear and the government has made it clear that they want to suppress the solidarity movement at all costs.”
In early May, more than 200 people were arrested on the Westwood campus as police dismantled tents and pushed out protesters in a clash that lasted hours. The police operation capped two days of upheaval on the campus that began when school officials declared the encampment “unlawful” and continued when a group of pro-Israel counterprotesters attacked the camp, with police taking hours to stop the violence.
UCLA officials have been sharply criticized over their handling of the situation. UCLA Police Chief John Thomas on Wednesday was removed from his post and reassigned over security failures that led to violence at the encampment. Thomas, who did not return phone calls this week seeking comment, defended his actions in a previous interview and said he did the best he could.
UCLA, like other universities across the country, has emerged as a hotbed of pro-Palestinian activism in recent months.
Students, faculty and staff have erected makeshift camps and demanded an end to Israel’s war in the Gaza Strip and that their universities divest from companies that sell weapons or services to Israel. Several camps, including one at Cal State Los Angeles, remain active. Others, including one at USC and another at UC Irvine, have been dismantled by police in recent weeks.
The response to the protests has stoked tensions between the academic workers union and the UC system.
The union announced Thursday that its ongoing strike would expand to UCLA and UC Davis on Tuesday. The academic workers contend that their free speech rights were violated when UC system leaders called on police to forcibly remove pro-Palestinian encampments at several campuses, including at UCLA.
The union leaders have demanded protection for free speech on campus; amnesty for all academic employees, students, student groups, faculty and staff who face disciplinary action or arrest due to participation in protests; and divestment by the university from “weapons manufacturers, military contractors, and companies profiting from Israel’s war on Gaza.”
According to the union, dozens of academic workers are still facing criminal charges, disciplinary action or both. Many are barred from campus, the union said, including campus housing and classes they may teach or attend.
Vincent Doehr, a graduate student and union member, said he supported the strike and blamed the university administration for much of the tension on campus.
“It’s a very fraught, violent environment that the administration has created here,” Doehr said. “The disruption to campus today is coming from administration shutting down this entire area due to an encampment that’s simply in the courtyard of one building.”
Doehr added that he hoped the strike would prompt the university to “negotiate in good faith with the movement for divestment, rather than calling the police on students every time they protest.”
The university has asked the state labor board to seek a court injunction to halt the strike, contending that the action is illegal.
“The University has made clear that it will treat all members of the community equally with respect to these violations and therefore, members of the university community who have been arrested for unlawful behavior or cited for a violation of university policy must go through the applicable review process, such as the student code of conduct,” according to a statement provided by the university system.
Times staff writers Jaweed Kaleem and Teresa Watanabe contributed to this report
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