Administrators and campus police at UCLA faced intense criticism Wednesday for failing to act quickly to stop an attack on a pro-Palestinian encampment on campus by counter-demonstrators who threw traffic cones and chairs, released pepper spray and tore down barriers.
Some pro-Palestinian demonstrators fought back, and skirmishes continued for hours before outside law enforcement agencies were called to intervene.
No one was arrested, and at least 15 protesters suffered injuries in the confrontation, part of a recent spate of escalating violence that’s occurring on some college campuses nationally over the Israel-Hamas war.
“The community needs to feel the police are protecting them, not enabling others to harm them,” Rebecca Husaini, chief of staff for the Muslim Public Affairs Council, said in a news conference on the Los Angeles campus later on Wednesday, where some Muslim students detailed the overnight events.
The call for more police intervention at UCLA stood in stark contrast to other campuses across the US, where officers’ actions were strongly condemned. At the University of Wisconsin in Madison, activists clashed with police officers.
The chaotic scenes unfolded early on Wednesday after the police burst into a building occupied by anti-war protesters at Columbia University on Tuesday night.
