Los Angeles, California – At the entrance to the pro-Palestinian camp at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), events on Wednesday were orderly and quiet, save for the constant hum of a police helicopter hovering overhead.
Those wanting to enter formed a queue and organizers told them the basic rules: Do not come into contact with the police or journalists. Ignore the counter-protesters. Do not throw away. No smoking or drinking.
But despite the relative calm, tensions were high. Just hours earlier, that night, a group of pro-Israel counter-protesters had attacked the camp, tearing down barricades and attacking demonstrators with metal pipes, clubs and pepper spray. Fireworks were also set off in the camp.
Classes at UCLA were canceled on Wednesday and the government released a statement condemning the “terrible acts of violence” against the camp set up to protest Israel’s war in Gaza.
Anna, a spokeswoman for the camp who declined to give her last name, said dozens of pro-Palestine protesters were injured or pepper-sprayed in the attack, which lasted from late Tuesday night into the early hours of Wednesday morning.
She added that the attack took place partly under the supervision of police, who intervened several hours after the violence began.
“The police did nothing,” she told Al Jazeera on Wednesday, noting that she was still feeling the aftereffects of pepper spray and punches from an attacker from the pro-Israel contingent. She said she spent hours helping other injured people.
“They came at us with metal pipes. Numerous people had to be taken to hospital due to their serious injuries. One person was left in a wheelchair. Another had his hand completely shattered.”
By daybreak on Wednesday, the space previously used by pro-Israel protesters was largely empty, with several large Israeli flags flapping in the wind. However, reports of an increased police presence raised suspicions that the pro-Palestinian camp would be evacuated later in the day.
UCLA police and CSC Los Angeles, a campus security and event management company, did not respond to questions from Al Jazeera at the time of publication.
Anna sees a contrast between the police’s apathetic response to last night’s violence and the way law enforcement has aggressively broken up pro-Palestinian protests on college campuses across the country.
In New York City, for example, an estimated 282 protesters were arrested overnight as police cleared demonstrations at Columbia University and the City College of New York.
There was a large police presence on the UCLA campus Wednesday, with about a dozen patrol cars looking toward the encampment.
Still, it was a sleepy scene: Protesters listened to speeches in silence while officers were seen checking their phones. Every now and then a heckler would come by, but he was largely ignored.
Anna told Al Jazeera that Tuesday night’s attack was, however, the culmination of several days of harassment.
The aggression of pro-Israel counter-protesters has grown with “increasing intensity,” she said. There had even been an attempt to break into the camp the night before.
Anna said counter-protesters also set up loudspeakers at night to play a handful of songs over and over again, apparently in an effort to deprive the protesters of sleep and disturb their peace of mind. She compared their methods to those used by Israeli forces against Palestinian prisoners.
However, she stressed that the students in the camp do not want the violence to affect their message.
They prefer to remain focused on Israel’s war in Gaza, which has killed more than 34,000 Palestinians, most of them women and children, and displaced more than 90 percent of the enclave’s population.
Despite reports of rights abuses by Israeli forces, the US government steadfastly supports the Israeli military offensive.
Campus protesters like those at UCLA are calling for an end to university investments in companies seen as complicit in Israel’s war and occupation of Palestinian territories. They have also called for ending university ties with Israeli institutions.
“Even though we were subjected to this incredible violence last night, this is not about us as students,” Anna said. “This is about how we as students can draw attention to the plight of the Palestinians and the genocide in Gaza. What has brought so many people to this camp is our love for Palestine, for the life and dignity of the freedom of Palestinians.”
Political pressure
The attack on the camp is one of the most violent expressions yet of rising tensions on college campuses across the United States.
From coast to coast, students have set up camps, occupied buildings and committed other acts of civil disobedience to oppose U.S. support for the war.
However, university administrators and elected officials, including President Joe Biden, have alleged that the protests also included instances of anti-Semitism, thereby creating an unsafe learning environment for Jewish students.
But protest organizers at UCLA and elsewhere reject that claim. Jewish, Arab and Muslim communities have reported an increase in harassment and discrimination since the war in Gaza began nearly seven months ago on October 7.
Still, two congressional hearings have been held since December to examine allegations of anti-Semitism on campus, with the presidents of four top universities invited for questioning. Two of these presidents have since resigned.
On Wednesday, the House of Representatives took further action to address anti-Semitism on campus.
She passed a bill to add a definition of anti-Semitism to civil rights law that could potentially penalize criticism of Israel. While the bill has not yet been voted on in the Senate, critics fear that any resulting law could be used to withhold funding from universities that engage in pro-Palestinian activism.
Facing pressure from lawmakers to crack down on the protests, many universities have called police to disperse protesters, including Columbia and Yale, two prestigious Ivy League institutions.
Still, after the overnight attack on UCLA on Wednesday, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass released a statement condemning the “abhorrent violence” and calling for an independent investigation.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom also released a statement saying those who took part in illegal actions “must be held accountable,” but without specifying that pro-Palestinian protesters were the group that was attacked.
Still, Anna called on politicians to do more to support the UCLA protesters and protect their right to free speech.
“The majority of support comes from other students, community members and family,” Anna said. “So far, I have not seen a high-ranking politician condemn the attacks on us last night in the same way that he condemned Jewish students who felt unsafe because of anti-Zionist activity on campus.”