Dueling demonstrations are set at UCLA Sunday by outside groups planning to show support for a growing encampment of pro-Palestinian protesters on the campus along with counter-protesters rallying around the university’s Jewish students.
Members of the Harriet Tubman Center for Social Justice have set a 9:30 a.m. demonstration to support students’ right to protest. The group’s planned gathering comes in response to a request from pro-Palestine protesters at the campus.
At 11 a.m., a group called Stand With Us will hold a “Stand in Support of Jewish Students” rally to “stand up against hatred and antisemitism.” The rally is being co-sponsored by the United Jewish Coalition in partnership with the Israel American Council and several related organizations.
Overnight, pro-Palestine protesters expanded their campus encampment outside to stretch from the top of the Janss Steps to the east end of Royce Hall.
The growing number of pro-Palestine protester has been met with an equally fervent group of counter-protesters who have played loud music near the encampment and shouted chants about Palestine preceded by an obscenity, according to the Daily Bruin, UCLA’s student newspaper.
One counter-protester stomped on a Palestinian flag at the encampment while another ripped posters off the exterior of the encampment, the Daily Bruin reported.
As of Sunday morning, groups supporting the counter-protesters had raised $64,478 on GoFundMe, gofundme.com/f/ucla-counter-protest, to support Bruins for Israel, more the twice the initial $26,000 goal.
The makeshift cluster of more than 50 camping tents for the pro-Palestine protesters began forming early Thursday and continued to grow over the weekend.
Organizers of UCLA’s “Palestine Solidarity Encampment,” similar to their counterparts at USC, issued a list of demands calling for divestment of all University of California and UCLA Foundation funds from companies tied to Israel, along with a demand that the university call for an immediate and permanent ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war and an academic boycott by UC against Israeli universities, including a suspension of study-abroad programs.
“For 201 days, Israel has murdered, injured, starved, disappeared, displaced and kidnapped Palestinians with impunity,” according to a message posted online by organizers of the UCLA encampment, which include the UC Divest Coalition at UCLA, Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace UCLA.
“For 201 days, the world has watched in silence as Israel has murdered over 30,000 Palestinians. Today, UCLA joins students across the country in demanding that our universities divest from the companies which profit off of the occupation, apartheid and genocide in Palestine. Now, more than ever, we must rise in solidarity to demand that the world centers Palestine, that the genocide is immediately ended and that our university is no longer complicit in human rights violations.”
Participants erected a makeshift wooden fence alongside the encampment and displayed signs with slogans such as “UCLA Says Free Palestine,” “Blood on the UC Hands” and “When people are occupied, resistance is justified.”
It was unclear whether all of the participants were UCLA students.
“Our top priority is always the safety and wellbeing of our entire Bruin community,” Mary Osako, vice chancellor of UCLA Strategic Communications, said in a statement Thursday morning. “We’re actively monitoring this situation to support a peaceful campus environment that respects our community’s right to free expression while minimizing disruption to our teaching and learning mission.”
As was the case over the weekend, a small group of counter-protesters, some holding Israeli flags, began gathering at the launch of the encampment on Thursday.
The day remained mostly peaceful, but early Thursday evening some brief shoving matches broke out, prompting a quick response from campus security, which worked to keep the two groups apart.
There have been no reports of injuries or arrests at the UCLA demonstrations.