At one Calif. universities, school is shut down as protest occupy tower and refuse to leave
On Wednesday, violent anti-Israel demonstrations continued to wreak havoc on numerous colleges across the country.
According to local media reports, a rally at the University of Texas at Austin erupted into conflict and necessitated several dozen detention and officers in riot gear to suppress the agitated crowd.
However, according to the Texas Tribune,” student demonstrators regrouped on the South Mall and briefly set up a few tents.”
” Law enforcement forced protesters off the lawn, creating a boundary behind a chain-link barrier and pushing them onto the streets. Students were finally herded further using system shields and their horses, which occasionally came within eating range of protesters. A procession of mounted position troopers and officers on foot followed by a procession of mounted state troopers and officers on foot. Spectators climbed onto trees, people’s shoulders and balconies to watch the commotion”.
At the University of Southern California, arrests were also made.
According to the Los Angeles Times, “LAPD officers in riot gear arrested at least 35 people as they moved to clear an encampment at the center of the USC campus” in protest of the Hamas-Israeli conflict.
As officers from the campus Department of Public Safety instructed students to remove the tents on Wednesday and, at one point, dragged away lawn chairs, the tents at USC repeatedly went up and down. Students picked up their tents and circled them to avoid breaking the university’s” no camping” policy. Throughout the afternoon, at least two Los Angeles Police Department helicopters circled above Alumni Park.
Students there took over a building and surrounded themselves inside it after” a violent clash with campus and local police Monday night,” according to the Sacramento Bee, adding:” After a violent clash with campus and local police, students there took over a building and barricaded themselves inside.
The atmosphere around Siemens Hall was joyful as students occupied the hall. Tuesday night, hundreds of students gathered in the quad around the occupied building to make signs, take part in a Palestinian student activist’s dabke dance lessons, and light candles at a makeshift altar. As community members spent the night in tents eating homemade Mexican food, yoga, and burned sage, a local band set up and played live music as they settled in.
The university announced on its website on Wednesday afternoon that the campus would be closed as a result of the protest.
” Protestors keep occupying Siemens Hall and another Cal Poly Humboldt building. The campus will now be closed all weekend, and all day long, no one will be able to work or study there. The University is making various contingency plans, including possibly keeping campus closed beyond that”, according to the statement, which added:
The safety, health, and wellbeing of our students is paramount as the situation has become increasingly complex. There are unidentified non- students with unknown intentions, in Siemens Hall. This creates an unpredictable environment. In addition, all entrances to the building are barricaded, creating a fire hazard. Adding to health and safety concerns, many toilets are no longer working.
Siemens Hall’s occupation results in complex operational issues that require the closure of other campus facilities. In particular, protestors have shown a willingness to enter unlocked buildings and either lock themselves in or steal equipment, increasing the likelihood of other buildings being occupied. Other students are trying to finish their classes at the end of the semester, which is also having a negative impact from the occupation. …
Numerous laws have been broken, including resisting arrest, destroying and damaging property, criminal trespass, and more.
Universities in New York City were faced with a chaotic week as a result of these protests and encampments, with both Columbia and New York University sending in police to detain dozens of student demonstrators who refused to leave their occupation encampments.
According to data compiled by researchers at the Harvard Kennedy School and the University of Connecticut,” the events of the past week are the latest crescendo in a movement that has seen more than 8, 000 pro-Palestine protests in over 850 cities and towns across the U.S.,” The Wall Street Journal reported.
” Organizers, law- enforcement officials and political leaders are now girding for a summer of protests, potentially culminating with July’s GOP convention in Milwaukee and August’s Democratic convention in Chicago, the same city marred by violence during anti- Vietnam War activism in 1968″, it added.
MORE: Pro-Palestine students set up a “liberation zone” camp in Harvard Yard.
IMAGE: screenshot
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