Stanford Protest Camp Dismantled After 13 Arrests at Pro-Palestinian Occupation

Updated 2:35 p.m. Wednesday

After 13 people were arrested when pro-Palestinian activists barricaded themselves inside the office of Stanford’s president Wednesday morning, campus officials cleared a protest encampment that had been set up weeks earlier on a central plaza, university officials said.

The protesters entered the building housing the offices of the university president and provost off the main quad early Wednesday, the final day of classes for the spring quarter, saying they planned to stay until their demands were met or they were forcibly removed.

Stanford police and Santa Clara County sheriff’s officials responded and began arresting people within about two hours, and by 9:45 a.m. the building was cleared, according to the university.

Protesters trying to interfere with a transport vehicle shoved a public safety officer, who was injured, university spokesperson Dee Mostofi said in a statement.

Officials said they found damage inside the building, and the sandstone exterior of the building and others around it in the main quad area were graffitied with messages including “kill cops,” “death to Israel” and “free Palestine.”

“This graffiti conveys vile and hateful sentiments that we condemn in the strongest terms,” President Richard Saller and Provost Jenny Martinez wrote in a statement. “Whether the graffiti was created by members of the Stanford community or outsiders, we expect that the vast majority of our community joins us in rejecting this assault on our campus.”

Students who were arrested will be immediately suspended, and any who are seniors will be barred from graduating, Saller and Martinez said.

Among the people arrested was a Stanford Daily reporter covering the occupation, according to a representative for the student newspaper. In a statement, the Daily told KQED that the student was wearing Stanford Daily attire and a press badge.

After the law enforcement arrests, campus officials also cleared the pro-Palestinian encampment on Stanford’s White Plaza as well as a nearby pro-Israel installation with U.S. and Israeli flags. Barricades were set up around the university’s main quad and White Plaza, where the encampment had been since early April. In a statement, the university said that the encampment violated a number of university policies but had been allowed to remain in place prior to the occupation.

“The situation on campus has now crossed the line from peaceful protest to actions that threaten the safety of our community,” the statement said.

Aaron Schimmel, a Jewish graduate student at Stanford, said he felt the university had not taken violations of school rules by protesters seriously enough before the occupation.

“It’s just mob rule on campus,” Schimmel said while standing outside the president’s office Wednesday morning.

Tree, a 20-year-old student who declined to share her last name for fear of retaliation by the university, called the school’s decision to remove the encampment “cowardly.”

“It’s more important now than ever to mobilize and keep our eyes and keep our goals towards a free Palestine, because that is ultimately what we are fighting for,” Tree told KQED. “More than divestment, more than just our right to free speech, more than more rights and protections for Muslim, Palestinian and Arab students, we want a free Palestine.”

The group behind the building occupation, Stanford for Palestine, wants Stanford’s Board of Trustees to consider a proposal to divest from companies tied to Israel’s military assault on the Gaza Strip and for Saller to support the bill. Activists also demand that the university drop all disciplinary action against students involved in previous pro-Palestinian protests on campus.

According to Emily Williams, a spokesperson for the students, they “believe that Stanford has not acted in good faith or moved in the direction of divestment, and so their demands still remain the same, which are divestment from companies that are materially and or monetarily contributing to or working with the Zionist, Israeli entity.”

Williams said the students who were arrested were being held at the Santa Clara County Main Jail in San Jose as of Wednesday afternoon.

KQED’s Joseph Geha contributed to this report.