Police and pro-Palestinian protesters clash at UCLA after new encampments erected

A violent scuffle broke out between police officials and pro-Palestinian protesters after new encampments were erected inside the campus of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) on Thursday (May 23).

The police officials were seen wearing riot gear when they walked inside the UCLA campus before clashes broke out with the protesters.

In a joint statement, UCLA’s administrative vice chancellor Michael Beck and associate vice chancellor Rick Braziel said that school officials had “withdrawn consent to remain on campus for the demonstrators on Kerckhoff patio, asking them to disperse immediately.”

UCLA officials said that the activities of the protesters, “including erecting barricades, establishing fortifications, and blocking access to parts of the campus and buildings,” had been disrupting campus operations.

Also Read: NYU forces pro-Palestinian protesters to watch 'The Simpsons' as punishment

As per the UCLA officials, those protesters who did not disperse will be facing a seven-day suspension, arrest and disciplinary action.

School’s chancellor Gene Block earlier testified about an infamous protest, which took place on the campus earlier this month. As per KTLA, the chancellor said, “Tragically, it took several hours for law enforcement to quell the violence. With the benefit of hindsight, we should have been prepared to immediately remove the encampment if and when the safety of our community was put at risk."

Meanwhile, the union members said that their free speech rights were violated when UC system leaders appealed to police to use force to clear pro-Palestinian encampments from the campuses.

Speaking to the Los Angeles Times, a graduate student and union member, Vincent Doehr said, “It’s a very fraught, violent environment that the administration has created here. The disruption to campus today is coming from administration shutting down this entire area due to an encampment that’s simply in the courtyard of one building.”

Students walk out of Harvard graduation ceremony, chant ‘Free, free Palestine’

Students, wearing graduation robes, walked out of the Harvard graduation ceremony on Thursday (May 23) chanting “Free, free Palestine”. 

The incident happened a day after it was announced that 13 Harvard students, who participated in the encampments, wont be given their diplomas alongside their classmates.

Watch: Pro-Palestine university protests spread from US to UK

Students also chanted “Let them walk, let them walk” during the commencement, as they referred to those 13 students who were denied their diplomas.

As reported by the Associated Press, student speaker Shruthi Kumar said, “This semester our freedom of speech and our expressions of solidarity became punishable".

She added that she recognised “the 13 undergraduates in the class of 2024 who will not graduate today". “I am deeply disappointed by the intolerance for freedom of speech and the right to civil disobedience on campus," she added.

The students in the encampment had appealed for a ceasefire in Gaza and asked Harvard to divest from companies which have been supporting the war.

(With inputs from agencies)