In pre-dawn action, hundreds of policemen enter UCLA to quell massive students' protest

Hundreds of police officers armed with batons and shields have stormed the University of California, Los Angeles in an attempt to disperse a pro-Palestinian demonstration camp that was attacked less than twenty-four hours earlier by supporters of Israel.

According to the Los Angeles Times, the police officers wearing helmets proceeded to eliminate various objects, including wood panels, that functioned as barriers to enter the camp.

In order to apprehend those who would not leave, the authorities forced their way onto the campus in the wee hours of the morning, at roughly 3.15 am PDT (3.45 pm IST).

At dusk on Wednesday, when the policemen in tactical gear initially started streaming onto the UCLA campus, there were estimated to be between 300 and 500 police officers inside the camp and another 2,000 outside the barriocades.

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According to reports, police fired flash-bang tupe devices that reverberated around the campus. Shouting “push them back” and dazzling lights in the police’s face, some protestors retaliated.In preparation for the siege, a few of them were spotted wearing respirator masks, hard hats, and goggles the day after the university ruled the campsite illegal.

Police repeatedly ordered protestors to vacate the demonstration area before entering it via loudspeaker announcements.

There was a violent altercation between the residents of the tent city after a group of masked counter-demonstrators unexpectedly attacked it. Before the altercation, in which both sides exchanged blows and drenched each other with pepper spray, the residents of the makeshift protest camp had been mostly calm.

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Before authorities were able to restore order, the altercation continued for two or three hours into Wednesday morning. Later, a representative for California Governor Gavin Newsom denounced as “unacceptable” the “limited and delayed campus law enforcement response” to the disturbances.

Following the confrontations, the university announced that, with the exception of restricted hours on Thursday and Friday, the almost 52,000-student campus—which includes graduate and undergraduate students—would remain closed.

The police action at UCLA happened the day after pro-Palestinian demonstrators in New York City were detained for setting up a tent city on the campus of the Ivy League university and occupying a building at Columbia University.

The largest wave of US student activity since the 2020 anti-racism marches and demonstrations included the altercations at UCLA and in New York.

In recent days, students have protested or established tent camps at numerous US campuses, asking that schools divest from businesses that support the Israeli government and calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. To put an end to the protests, some schools have called in the police.