Weeks after their first protest encampment was violently attacked by counter protesters, pro-Palestinian demonstrators at UCLA have erected a second encampment in defiance of the university’s orders. This encampment appears much smaller than the previous one, with at least two tents set up in the area and a handful of protesters chanting, waving Palestinian flags and signs. Despite the encampment’s size, the police response was swift—a stark difference from the hands-off approach that UCLA had employed before the counter protesters’ attack on April 30. Video posted by the Daily Bruin showed Santa Monica officers in riot gear marching on campus, and a prisoner transport bus from the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department parked nearby. UCLA is still dealing with the fallout from that earlier clash—on Thursday, the school’s union of academic staff joined a strike demanding free speech protections on campus, an action the university is trying to declare illegal. Meanwhile the university’s chancellor, Gene Block, was across the country at a congressional hearing, where he was put on blast for his handling of the incident.
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