A demonstration against Israel’s war on Gaza at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) turned violent when a pro-Israel mob attacked a solidarity camp occupied by peaceful pro-Palestinian protesters.
Witnesses said the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) only intervened after nearly four hours of attacks that began Wednesday night when masked pro-Israel counter-protesters who showed up by the hundreds from outside the university campus hurled fireworks into the encampment .
Another fireworks display in the camp pic.twitter.com/aJN4HTeHlI
— Mel Buer (@mel_buer) May 1, 2024
The attackers, carrying Israeli flags, then tried to dismantle the pro-Palestinian camp by attacking students with pepper spray, sticks, stones and metal fences. Police stood by and failed to protect the students, who reclaimed the metal fences thrown at them to protect themselves, said Joey Scott, an investigative journalist who spoke to Al Jazeera from the scene.
Before police arrived, a group reportedly attacked a person lying on the ground, kicking and punching him until others pulled him out of the crowd.
Finally, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass issued a statement on X early Wednesday morning saying police were responding to requests for assistance from the UCLA administration. The LAPD confirmed their intervention at around 2 a.m. (09:00 GMT).
At the request of UCLA, LAPD is responding to multiple incidents of violence within the large encampment on their campus to assist UCLA PD and other law enforcement agencies in restoring order and maintaining public safety.
– LAPD Headquarters (@LAPDHQ) May 1, 2024
“Tonight there was terrible violence at the camp and we immediately called law enforcement and asked for mutual aid,” Mary Osako, a senior UCLA official, told the campus newspaper, the Daily Bruin.
Al Jazeera’s Rob Reynolds reported from Los Angeles that student protesters stood firm. The number of injured was not yet known, but reports on social media suggested some people had been taken away with injuries, he said, describing the “truly shocking and ugly scene of violence.”
The vigilante mob appeared to come from off campus. “It appears to be mostly people who are not of college age and are not from the UCLA campus, but what they are doing is harassing and attacking the pro-Palestinian protesters,” Reynolds said.
Bass called the violence “absolutely abhorrent and inexcusable.”
The anti-war group said: “Law enforcement simply stood at the edge of the lawn and refused to budge while we screamed for help. The only way we could protect ourselves was each other,” as the attack lasted more than seven hours.
“The university would rather see us dead than divest ourselves,” said a statement published on X.
STATEMENT FROM THE BEIJED PALESTINE SOLIDARITY CAMP AT UCLA
The only way we could protect ourselves was each other. WE CARE FOR OUR SAFETY.
The hypocrisy of the university
all too obvious. The university would rather see us dead than separate us.Call on UCLA to disclose, divest and end the silence pic.twitter.com/5MnsupISWp
— People’s City Council – Los Angeles (@PplsCityCouncil) May 1, 2024
Nationwide escalation
The UCLA attack is the latest escalation in two weeks of demonstrations against Israel’s war on Gaza, which have spread to universities in the United States and some universities in other countries.
Pro-Palestinian students at UCLA had occupied campus grounds for the past two days, demanding the university’s financial ties with Israel be severed.
Late Tuesday, New York police arrested dozens of pro-Palestinian protesters who had barricaded themselves in an academic building on Columbia University’s Manhattan campus, removing a protest encampment that the Ivy League school had been trying to break up for nearly two weeks .
The police operation in Columbia came on the 56th anniversary of a similar attempt to prevent the occupation of Hamilton Hall by students protesting racism and the Vietnam War.
Just blocks from Columbia, at the City College of New York, protesters got into a confrontation with police outside the public college’s main gate. Videos on social media showed officers pushing people around as they cleared them from the street and sidewalk. Many arrested demonstrators were dispersed on city buses.
Scott said he believed the police’s delayed response to the violence at UCLA would serve as “inspiration” to would-be attackers to force pro-Palestinian protesters to drop their demands.
“If they are trying to suppress future violence, they have done a terrible job because it appears to be fully endorsed,” he said.
Al Jazeera’s Reynolds said the mob at UCLA reminded him of “settler violence on the…” [occupied] West Bank without the use of such lethal force, but this is clearly a violent, uncontrolled mob bent on chaos.”
A member of the pro-Israel mob carried a large yellow flag with a crown and the words “Messiah.” “These are symbols of radical, far-right Jewish groups,” Reynolds said.
It was not known how the mob was organized.