Police Crack Down On Protestors At Um
Gifford Brickley
Questions continue to swirl about whether extremist groups are involved in the protests, which first drew national attention at Columbia University in New York, and whether the protests themselves include hate speech. But the UCLA protest was one that was conclusively influenced by a clash with extremist forces this week.
They installed makeshift barricades of plywood and pallets to close up the protest area. Over the next few days, the protest grew to include a medic station and food area. Dozens of tents were also set up.
A pivotal moment for the UCLA protest came after midnight Tuesday into Wednesday morning, when a large group of counter-protestors gathered on the lawn east of the camp. Some wore sweatshirts with pro-Israel messages, waved Israeli flags and flags tied to Jewish organizations, and chanted pro-Israel slogans.
For hours, counter-protesters attacked the camp, running in and pulling back sections of the makeshift fence, spraying chemical agents through holes in the barricade and launching fireworks into the camp.
The counter-protesters began attacking pro-Palestine protesters who ventured outside the camp, beating some with weapons and spraying them with pepper spray. Police had no obvious response or presence at the time.
Inside the camp, protesters began preparing for conflict. Personal protective equipment including hundreds of helmets, masks and eye goggles poured into the camp from donors, including students, as well as a continuous stream of scrap wood and construction materials to reinforce the barricades.
Shortly after 4 a.m. on Thursday, the police made their final push into the camp: Officers dismantled the barricade at the eastern edge of the protest, sometimes engaging in tussles with protesters. At least one man was seriously injured.
Protesters calling for a ceasefire in Gaza shut down parts of Independence Avenue and demonstrated for several hours in the Cannon House Office Building rotunda Wednesday. More than 300 people were arrested, a Capitol Police spokesperson said around 6:30 p.m., adding that the number could rise.
Tlaib, who is the daughter of Palestinian immigrants and is the first Palestinian-American woman elected to Congress, was criticized on Wednesday for refusing to take the post down and again referenced the destruction of the hospital when speaking in front of the crowd of protesters gathered on the National Mall (before it moved toward the Cannon building).
Three protesters were arrested by Wednesday afternoon for assault on a police officer, and there was property damage outside the building, according to the Capitol Police. The damage incidents are currently being investigated, according to the spokesperson.
Wearing keffiyehs an carrying signs that said things like "Free Palestine" and "Hands off Rafah," the protesters then walked across Franklin Street, through campus, and then did a lap on Cameron and Columbia, ending their march back at the Peace and Justice Plaza, police said.
During the early hours of Wednesday morning, crews began cleaning up the quad area, removing graffiti from walls and taking down many of the metal barricades on the quad. However, fencing remained around the flag pole while portable security cameras and lights were set up on Polk Place.
The committee also said it would be looking for administration to provide guidance on whether provisions would be made for students who do not want to be on campus currently, if deadlines would be extended and if finals would be adjusted to accommodate the situation.
Protesters eventually retreated to the sidewalk near South Building and the Old Well on West Cameron Avenue. While protesters were off of the quad, police and crews in yellow vests started removing items from the quad and placing them in black trash bags.
Around 8 a.m., a demonstration organizer said over a megaphone that the people who were detained were being taken to the Orange County Courthouse and was asked people to go to the courthouse in order to support whoever was detained.
Officers also detained several people at Fordham University in New York and cleared an encampment set up inside a school building, officials said, and law enforcement were on standby at Columbia University across town after mass arrests the previous evening.
"We were assaulted, brutally arrested. And I was held for up to six hours before being released, pretty banged up, got stomped on, got cut up," one CUNY student who gave his name only as Jose told AFP.
"We've seen things like severe head traumas, concussions, someone was knocked unconscious in the encampment by police, someone was thrown down the stairs," said the student, who gave her name as Isabel.
"We believe it's a small number of students who are causing this disruption, and if they're going to protest, Americans have the right to do it in a peaceful way within the law," White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters.
Protesters linked arms and blocked lanes of Interstate 190 around 7 a.m., a demonstration they said was part of a global "economic blockade to free Palestine," according to Rifqa Falaneh, one of the organizers. Traffic in the San Francisco Bay Area was also snarled for four hours Monday morning as pro-Palestinian demonstrators shut down all traffic on the Golden Gate Bridge and stalled a 17-mile (27-kilometer) stretch of Interstate 880 in Oakland.
Among them was Madeline Hannan from suburban Chicago. She was headed to O'Hare for a work trip to Florida when her and her husband's car ended up stalled for 20 minutes. She got out and "both ran and speed walked" more than 1 mile. She said she made it to the gate on time, but barely.
Several protesters were arrested at the Golden Gate Bridge demonstration and traffic resumed shortly after noon, according to the California Highway Patrol. Also by noon, more highway lanes opened up to traffic on Interstate 880 in nearby Oakland after officers removed six protesters who had locked themselves to barrels.
In Chicago, dozens of protesters were arrested, according to Falaneh. Chicago police said Monday that "multiple people" were taken into custody after a protest where people obstructed traffic but did not have a detailed count.
Anti- war protesters have demonstrated in Chicago near daily since Hamas' Oct. 7 attack on southern Israel that killed around 1,200 people. Israeli warplanes and ground troops have conducted a scorched-earth campaign on the Gaza Strip.
The Israeli offensive has killed more than 33,700 Palestinians, according to the Gaza health ministry. The ministry does not differentiate between civilians and combatants in its count but says women and children make up two-thirds of the dead.
The protest began in Westwood in front of the Hammer Museum, where several speakers discussed negative experiences with university police and their goals for abolishing university police. Protesters then marched on the street down Westwood Boulevard to the UCLA Police Department headquarters while engaging in call back chants. There, protesters led more chants until walking back down Westwood Boulevard.
UCLA Transportation personnel and Contemporary Services Corporation event staff blocked traffic from Westwood Boulevard in front of the UCLA UCPD headquarters before the protest and directed traffic away from Westwood Boulevard when the protesters came close to campus.
Michelle Servin, a fourth-year geography/environmental studies student who helped organize the protest, said she hopes the administration sees many people do not want police on campus. Servin is a part of No UCPD, a group made of undergraduate and graduate students who are also calling to abolish university police.
The police did not explain why they were arresting the protesters, only telling them that their actions were prohibited by law. There were no allegations of violence. The protesters were subsequently charged under the Law on Reporting of Communicable Diseases (2019) and the Public Assembly Act (1985).
The government should not use the Covid-19 pandemic as an excuse to silence dissent and violate fundamental human rights, including freedoms of expression, peaceful assembly, and association. Since the pandemic began, Human Rights Watch has strongly condemned the misuse of public health restrictions as a pretense for rights violations in Algeria, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Cameroon, Central Asia, Egypt, Hungary, Jordan, Thailand, and elsewhere. The Philippine government has previously been criticized for using Covid-19 restrictions to quash dissent.
The Pride arrests underscore why protesters are rightfully concerned about the Anti-Terrorism Act, which would make it much easier for police to arrest critics of the government without a court warrant and detain them without charge for up to 24 days. President Rodrigo Duterte should not sign the Anti-Terrorism Act, and lawmakers should go back to the drawing board and ensure any future counterterrorism legislation protects the right to peaceful protest.
Cracking down on protests is an affront to the very notion of Pride. Authorities in the Philippines should immediately release all those arrested on June 26 and reaffirm their fundamental right to peaceful protest under domestic and international law.
Monday saw another day of protest at UT-Austin, and once again, state troopers and city police escalated an initially peaceful protest into a chaotic and violent clash between students and law enforcement.
When they passed the UT Tower and the South Lawn, they found a bus full of state troopers attempting to leave campus. After some protesters tried to block the bus, state troopers on foot dispersed the blockade and the bus was able to back slowly down 22nd. Around 5pm, it finally left and turned onto Dean Keeton to applause from the protesters. At 6:30, some protesters were still trying to block police from transporting arrestees off campus.
Senegalese police officers killed three people, including a 16 year-old boy, and arrested hundreds in a violent crackdown on protesters in Saint-Louis, Dakar and Ziguinchor on 9-10 February as many people demonstrated against the delay of presidential elections, Amnesty International said today.
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