Cal State L.A. shuts down encampment as tensions rise

Authorities shut down a pro-Palestinian student encampment at California State University, Los Angeles, earlier this week amid rising tensions, the Los Angeles Times reported.

Officers from the LAPD, California Highway Patrol and multiple Cal State police departments descended on campus in riot gear early Monday afternoon but did not use weapons to remove protesters and made no arrests, university spokesperson Erik Frost Hollins told the Times.

Other nearby universities, including the University of Southern California and the University of California, Los Angeles, acted relatively swiftly to shut down student encampments this spring. But the one at Cal State LA stood for about 50 days.

What had been a peaceful relationship between protesters and university officials changed last week, when several dozen protesters barricaded themselves and some administrators inside a student services building for more than nine hours. 

“The only acceptable option for the safety of the entire campus community was for the encampment to disband and disperse. We will not negotiate with those who would use destruction and intimidation to meet their goals,” Cal State LA president Berenecea Johnson Eanes said. “It does not escape me that public employees serving a public mission at a public university in one of the region’s most under-resourced communities have been victimized by those claiming to protest injustice.”

When police arrived on Monday, they found about 10 protesters left in the encampment, all of whom departed voluntarily after officials issued a dispersal order. Shortly afterwards, forklifts tore down the graffitied wooden barricades and vacated tents, depositing them in dumpsters. 

Elsewhere in the state, protests ended Wednesday at the University of California, Davis, but the decision there was entirely student driven. They announced they would conclude the demonstration even though not all their demands had been met.