Fight Back News Service is circulating the following statement from SDS Humboldt and Occupy Cal Poly Humboldt

On April 27th, 2024, Cal Poly Humboldt students, with the mediation of faculty, have reached out to administration in hopes of reengaging negotiations. Students have collectively decided they will vacate Siemens Hall if their demands are agreed to. These are as follows:

Los Angeles, CA – On April 24, thousands of student activists and community members occupied Alumni Park in the middle of the University of Southern California (USC) to protest the ongoing genocide in Gaza. Student activists demanded that the university divest from corporations that sell weapons and technology to Israel, a complete academic boycott of Israel, and an end to its silence on the genocide of Palestine.

Something big is happening. From Columbia University to UCLA and points in between, the student movement that stands with Palestine has been erecting encampments on campuses. The results have been powerful. The demand for universities and colleges to divest from, and break all ties with, Israeli apartheid serves to weaken the apartheid regime.

Denver, CO – On Saturday, April 27, the Auraria Campus Encampment for Palestine entered its third day. Despite freezing temperatures and downpouring rain, dozens of protesters have remained through the second night at the encampment.

The previous day the encampment faced attacks from the Denver Police Department. After arresting over 70 protesters, DPD retreated from the encampment before returning a few hours later. Dozens of riot police surrounded the encampment and issued an order to disperse. The crowd linked arms and did not move.

St. Paul, MN – Starting April 26, Hamline University students are began occupying a building in support of Palestine. Members of the Hamline Students for Justice (HSJ) organized the Friday afternoon rally along with a group of 30 other students. They gathered outside of the Old Main building which houses the university’s administration offices. The fiery crowd started the rally chanting, “Free free Palestine!” and “Not another nickel, not another dime, no more money for Israel’s crimes.”

Denver, CO – On Friday, April 26, the Denver Police Department (DPD) attacked an encampment for Palestine set up by Students for a Democratic Society.

Tacoma WA – On Tuesday, April 23, over 150 students and faculty members from Tacoma School of the Arts, University of Washington Tacoma, and University of Puget Sound walked out of classes at 10:30 a.m. They rallied at Tollefson Plaza to demonstrate student solidarity with Palestine and demand that the United States of America divest from Israel.

Tallahassee, FL – On the early morning of April 25, about 20 students at Florida State University (FSU) started an encampment for Palestine on Landis Green in solidarity with student encampments across the country. Students at schools across the country, such as Columbia, Yale and the University of Minnesota have set up encampments to demand their universities divest and cut all ties to Israel.

Atlanta, GA – On April 25 students at Emory University hosted an encampment at their quad. The encampment followed the recent wave of encampments across the country demanding a free Palestine and university divestment from Israel. Hours after the encampment started, Atlanta Police Department and Georgia State Patrol began brutalizing protesters, shooting pepper balls and arresting them.

In a radical act of solidarity with the Palestinian people, university students across the country have escalated the struggles on their campuses with the campus encampment movement. At Emory University in Atlanta, students, faculty and community members created one such encampment demanding for the immediate and total divestment from the Israeli apartheid state. The Atlanta Police Department and Georgia State Patrol were called to the encampment by the Emory administration where they brutalized, beat and arrested dozens of protesters.

Arcata, CA – On Monday, April 22, around 4 p.m., roughly 30 students began a sit-in in Siemens Hall at Cal Poly Humboldt, California, to show solidarity with Palestine and with other campuses that are doing the same. While many students on other campuses are setting up encampments, theirs is the first in the movement to take over a building so far, and an admin building, no less. This also made them the first state university to join the movement.

Green Bay, WI – On March 22, the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay chapter of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) interrupted a College Democrats speaking event on campus that had U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin as a guest speaker. The event was promoted in secret on campus to prevent SDS from organizing and was supposed to teach students how to get people to vote for her. SDS found out and decided to mobilize.

Fight Back News Service is circulating the following statement from University of Rochester Students for a Democratic Society and Students for Justice in Palestine.

As of April 24, the administration of University of Rochester has announced that UR will move forward with an academic boycott from all ties to Israel. This was a demand of the occupation set up by Students for a Democratic Society and Students for Justice in Palestine, now won by the students.

Minneapolis, MN – On Tuesday, April 23 at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities, student activists set up a Gaza Solidarity encampment. This encampment was organized by the UMN Divest Coalition which is made up of Students for a Democratic Society, Students for Justice in Palestine, Young Democratic Socialists of America and Students for Climate Justice. The coalition is pushing for the University of Minnesota to cut ties financially with Israel. This means to divest from weapon manufacturers, stop study abroad trips to Israel and stop having defense companies doing recruitment on campus.

Tampa, FL – Protesters converged in solidarity with the struggle in Gaza to denounce Joe Biden’s visit to the Hillsborough Community College Dale Mabry campus on April 23. Nearly 400 protesters thronged the sidewalks surrounding the entrance, chanting and waving Palestinian flags.

Minneapolis, MN – On Sunday, April 21, a march of approximately 300 people from the Twin Cities metro area marched, blocking traffic for Earth Day.

The Climate Justice Committee (CJC) and Anti-War Committee (AWC) led the march. It drew attendees from the nearby Little Earth indigenous-preference housing complex, the surrounding East Phillips neighborhood, and Camp Nenookaasi, an encampment of the unhoused which has been forced by the city of Minneapolis to move many times.

Chicago, IL – Thousands of protesters took Michigan Avenue, Saturday afternoon, April 20 and marched to demand an end to U.S. funding for Israeli genocide in Palestine.

Led by the Coalition for Justice in Palestine, this was the 32nd mass mobilization since October 7 and demonstrated that people of Chicago are not intimidated by recent police escalation and repression in Chicago and across the country.

Fight Back News Service is circulating the following statement by the New Students for a Democratic Society (SDS).

While standing in solidarity with Palestine, the student movement has once again escalated protests on campus with the campus encampment movement. Students are calling out their universities and its administrators for their decades’ long support of Israel’s genocide of Palestinians and are demanding that our universities divest and cut all ties to Israel! University administrators have no right to ignore the students as university administrators continue to support the genocide in Gaza and maintain support for Israel.

Chicago IL – On April 17, over 70 students rallied and marched at the University of Illinois at Chicago to oppose U.S. war moves against Iran. The action was part of a National Day of Action called by Students for a Democratic Society.

Tampa, FL- Over 20 students at the University of South Florida marched April 18 to demand no U.S. attacks on Iran and an end to U.S. aid to Israel.

Tampa Bay SDS organized this protest and march as part of a National Day of Action called by National SDS in response to the April 1 Israeli bombing of the Iranian diplomatic mission in Damascus, Syria. Students marched from the library to the student center to show their support for Palestine and for the solidarity that Iran has shown towards Palestine.