Quick Take
At the pro-Palestine encampment at UC Santa Cruz on Monday, students said they have no plans to disband their camp after negotiations failed with administrators on Friday. Students and administrators said negotiations have not restarted yet.
It’s been almost two weeks since students set up a pro-Palestine encampment on the UC Santa Cruz campus, and on Monday they said they’re not planning to take it down any time soon.
“We’re still here” is the main message the students wanted to share Monday.
On Friday morning, the encampment organizers and the group UCSC Students for Justice in Palestine said that negotiations failed with administrators and that they were expecting a police raid as early as that evening. However, several people close to administrators involved in the negotiations maintained that the university continued to want to avoid police action.
As of Monday afternoon, there were still more than 60 tents – a slight reduction from the prior days – at the encampment that sprang up May 1 in Quarry Plaza. Students said that when they had elevated fears of a police raid Friday and through the weekend, some students chose to leave the camp.
Still, the encampment continued to have programming, with speeches and Mother’s Day activities throughout the weekend and into Monday.
A media liaison from the encampment, who chose to remain anonymous, told Lookout that since Friday, they haven’t had additional negotiations with administrators. A first-year student, she’s a UCSC Student for Justice in Palestine member and has spent most nights at the camp.
“I don’t believe there have been [more negotiations],” she said. “I think [administrators] are now just trying to wait us out. But it hasn’t worked so far, we’re sticking with it, we’re not gonna let them just passively push us out. So, it’s their move.”
Campus spokesperson Scott Hernandez-Jason didn’t respond to questions about whether negotiations were going to restart or when and if the university planned to call in the police.
He did, however, send the same statement the university released Friday.
“Over the past week, we engaged in talks to seek an amicable resolution including the voluntary disbanding of the encampment,” he wrote via email. “We continue to seek that outcome. We acknowledge the ongoing effects of the encampment’s presence on our campus and remain focused on the safety and health of our students and employees.”
Students at the encampment continue to demand that the University of California call for an immediate cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas war, that the UC divest from weapons-manufacturing companies and that the university cut ties with campus police, other law enforcement agencies and the Jewish student group Hillel International.
While an initial offer from UCSC administrators showed they would call for a cease-fire, in later offers they removed that call, according to documents of the negotiations obtained by Lookout.
Additionally, UCSC administrators offered to work with the University of California Office of the President to create a systemwide advisory group on socially conscious investments – an offer that addresses the students’ demands for divestment from weapons-manufacturing companies.
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