“Horrific acts of violence” erupted on the campus of the University of California, Los Angeles, Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning, after the arrival of a group of pro-Israel demonstrators who attempted to dismantle a pro-Israel encampment. Palestinian.
Shocking footage from the scene at UCLA showed the two sides openly clashing as university security abandoned the scene and local police were nowhere to be found.
Shortly before 11 p.m. local time, violence intensified when pro-Israelis surrounded the pro-Palestinian encampment. During this standoff, fireworks were launched over the camp.
The video showed both sides using pieces of wood as makeshift weapons. The walls of the camp were broken, at least one person was seen being dragged to the ground by another group.
“Horrible acts of violence took place at the camp this evening, and we immediately called law enforcement for mutual aid,” UCLA Vice Chancellor Mary Osako said in a tweet.
The LAPD said in a post that their presence was requested on the UCLA campus due to “multiple acts of violence.”
These clashes lasted about 90 minutes before Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass announced that law enforcement was about to be deployed to the college. At 1:30 a.m. local time, police officers and the California Highway Patrol arrived.
This chaos mirrors scenes seen on college campuses across the country, including at Columbia University in New York, where after activists ignored calls to dismantle their camps, police were forced to intervene and dismantle their camps. ‘stop the students.
Fireworks allegedly set by pro-Israel supporters explode near student camp
The violent scenes at UCLA mirrored those seen 3,000 miles away earlier in the night when New York police moved in and arrested student activists protesting the war in Gaza.
A pro-Palestinian protester (C) is beaten by counter-protesters
Pro-Israeli supporters attempt to dismantle pro-Palestinian encampment
Pro- and anti-Israel supporters clash on campus earlier Tuesday
The October 7 attack on southern Israel by Hamas militants from Gaza, and the subsequent Israeli offensive on the Palestinian enclave, sparked the largest wave of American student activism since protests against racism of 2020.
Just this week, police at the University of Texas at Austin, Tulane University in New Orleans, the University of North Carolina and the University of Connecticut forcibly removed camps from pro-Palestinian protest.
At Columbia University, the New York Police Department will remain on site until May 17 to prevent the creation of new encampments.
A few blocks away in Columbia, at the City College of New York, protesters clashed with police outside the public college’s main entrance.
Video posted to social media by journalists at the scene Tuesday evening showed police knocking some people to the ground and shoving others as they evacuated people from the street and sidewalks. Many detained protesters were taken away on city buses.
After police arrived, officers placed a Palestinian flag on top of the City College flagpole, balled it up and threw it to the ground before raising an American flag.
Brown University, another member of the Ivy League, reached an agreement Tuesday with protesters on its Rhode Island campus.
The protesters said they would close their encampment in exchange for a vote by trustees to divest from Israel in October.
The decision to call the police was condemned by the Columbia University chapter of the American Association of University Professors.
The compromise appears to be the first time an American university has agreed to vote on divestment following the protests.
The Columbia Police action came on the 56th anniversary of a similar move to quash the occupation of Hamilton Hall by students protesting racism and the Vietnam War.
The Police Department said Tuesday that officers will not enter the grounds without a request from the college administration or an imminent emergency.
From now on, the police will be there until May 17, the end date of the university’s opening ceremonies.
In a letter to top NYPD officials, Columbia President Minouche Shafik said the administration had asked police to remove protesters from the occupied building and a nearby tent encampment “with the utmost regret “.
Shafik also referenced the idea, first put forward by New York City Mayor Eric Adams earlier in the day, that the group occupying Hamilton was “led by individuals who are not not affiliated with the university.”
Neither provided specific evidence to support this claim, which was disputed by protest organizers and participants.
NYPD officials have made similar statements about “outside agitators” during the massive grassroots protests against racial injustice that erupted in the city following the death of George Floyd in 2020.
Columbia President Minouche Shafik called on the New York Police Department to “restore order and security” to campus, amid escalating protests that also included a massive encampment at the school.
Cops were armed with zip ties and pepper spray when they stormed the campus Tuesday around 9:3 p.m.
In some cases, senior police officials falsely characterized peaceful marches organized by well-known neighborhood activists as the work of violent extremists.
Before police arrived in Columbia, the White House condemned clashes there and at California State Polytechnic University in Humboldt, where demonstrators occupied two buildings for more than a year. week until baton-wielding police officers intervened early Tuesday and arrested 25 people.
President Joe Biden believes having students occupy a university building is “absolutely the wrong approach,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said.
Later, former President Donald Trump called into Sean Hannity’s show on Fox News Channel to comment on the unrest in Colombia as live footage of police evacuating Hamilton Hall was broadcast. Trump praised the officers.
“But it should never have come to this,” he told Hannity.
The nationwide campus protests began at Columbia in response to the Israeli offensive in Gaza after Hamas launched a deadly attack on southern Israel on October 7.
The militants killed around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took around 250 hostages. By promising to eradicate Hamas, Israel has killed more than 34,000 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, according to the local Health Ministry.
While ceasefire negotiations appeared to be gaining momentum, it was unclear whether those talks would inspire an easing of protests.
Israel and its supporters have called the university protests anti-Semitic, while Israel’s critics say it is using the allegations to silence opposition.
Although some demonstrators have been filmed making anti-Semitic remarks or violent threats, protest organizers, some of whom are Jewish, say it is a peaceful movement aimed at defending Palestinian rights and protest against the war.
On the Columbia campus, protesters first set up a tent encampment nearly two weeks ago. The school sent police to clear the tents the next day, arresting more than 100 people, and then the students returned.
Negotiations between protesters and the college have stalled in recent days, and the school has set a deadline for activists to abandon the tent encampment Monday afternoon or face suspension.
Instead, protesters defied the ultimatum and took over Hamilton Hall early Tuesday, carrying furniture and metal barricades.
Ilana Lewkovitch, a self-described “left-wing Zionist” student at Columbia, said it has been difficult to concentrate on school for weeks. His exams were disrupted by chants of “Say it loud, say it clearly, we want the Zionists out of here.”
Lewkovitch, who is Jewish, said she wishes current pro-Palestinian protests were more open to people like her who criticize Israel’s war policies but believe there should be an Israeli state.
dailymail us
