UCLA Palestine Solidarity Encampment Press Release

Campus safety left within minutes, external security the university hired for “backup” watched, filmed, and laughed on the side as the immediate danger inflicted upon us escalated. Law enforcement simply stood at the edge of the lawn and refused to budge as we screamed for their help. The only means of protection we had was each other. WE KEEP EACH OTHER SAFE.

Despite the danger, we refused to engage standing by the principles of our encampment—self defense. For all the school’s pretense of student safety, we have experienced an unprecedented amount of violence and hatred while they stood by. The university’s hypocrisy all too apparent, as signs of this escalation were reported, documented, and indicated early on. The zionist attacks, their use of chemical weaponry, their hatred, their destruction, are but a microcosm of the genocide in Gaza. The university would rather see us dead than divest. Media portrayal of neutrality and both sides only obfuscates the truth. We have no pepper spray, no gas canisters, no fireworks, and no aggression. All we had was our community to hold our wooden barriers. What more can we do? We ask yet again- no, we demand that the university end this sham. The sham of pretending that the school is neutral- it has chosen genocide before and it chooses genocide again.

Call on UCLA, protect your fellow students, & call for what we need- a divestment from systems of death that profit off of indiscriminate bombing and a call to end the genocide in Gaza & the occupation of Palestine.

In solidarity,
The besieged UCLA Palestine Solidarity Encampment