United States – Police on Wednesday retook the lecture hall that they had been occupied since the morning by pro-Palestinian protesters at the University of California, Irvine, and then cleared a student encampment that had stood for over two weeks, according to the witnesses.
Police Intervention
Officers from about ten nearby law enforcement agencies arrived at the campus upon the request of the university officials because protesters had seized the lecture hall, resulting in a “violent protest,” the police and college administrators reported.
Four hours later, the police had removed the protesters from the lecture hall and the plaza, which was the site of the encampment, according to the university police and the reporters from Reuters.
“The police have retaken the lecture hall,” UC Irvine spokesperson Tom Vasich said by telephone from the scene. “The plaza has been cleared by law-enforcement officers.”
University Response
Vasich declared that there had been “minimal arrests” and described the protesters as “begrudging co-operators.”
The University stated that classes would be conducted online on Thursday and discouraged employees from reporting to work on campus.
A protest was held in Irvine, a town located 40 miles (65 km) south of Los Angeles, on Friday, which was the latest in a series of campus demonstrations in the United States on the war in Gaza that placed a demand for a ceasefire and protection of civilians lives while also calling universities to divest from Israeli interests.
Background on Protests
On the 29th of April, there was a protest encampment set up next to the lecture hall at UC Irvine in the same way as the ones in other universities in the US that have led to mass arrests and confrontations between the police and the demonstrators.
On Wednesday alone there were up to 300 people who went to the lecture hall when there were no classes in session, shared Vasich.
Confrontation and Resolution
Police used heavy riot gear and formed barricades, and an officer warned people using the loudspeaker that they form an unlawful assembly and get arrested if they remained in the same place, the Orange County Register reported.
Students were heard chanting slogans, banging drums, and waving banners. Cops could be seen nearby, standing at a distance. This was the scene witnessed by Reuters. A banner declared the place to be “Alex Odeh Hall,” a building named after a Palestinian activist who was killed in a terrible 1985 office bombing in the nearby Santa Ana.
Due to the fact that four commercial buildings were sealed off this might result in hundreds of people seeking shelter inside them as announced Vasich.
Before the night fell, police broke the window of the lecture hall on one side, then drew into a tense confrontation with the protesters of the encampment on the other side.
A row of policemen with helmets and batons went up against protesters. The police made only small advances, and when they tried to go on all at once, they made new arrests.
It was not too long after that almost every protestor left the plaza overrun with rubbish, only some onlookers were standing at the edge of the scene.
University’s Position
On the very day the camp started, Chancellor Howard Gillman said that the University was attending students on their way to accommodate their aspirations of finding an “appropriate and non-disruptive” alternative site.
Gillman has indicated that the University cannot choose not to take any kind of action against the illegal encampment as they stated through, “The University of California has reiterated its commitment to not divest from Israel.”
“Encampment protesters have focused most of their demands on actions that would require the university to violate the academic freedom rights of faculty, the free speech rights of faculty and fellow students, and the civil rights of many of our Jewish students,” Gillman said on Monday.