As an Asian Pacific Islander Desi American (APIDA) newsmagazine, we strive to create a safe space on campus not only for those within our community, but for all UCLA students of different backgrounds. That means respecting everyone’s voices and First Amendment rights to free speech. Therefore the Pacific Ties Editorial Board condemns UCLA’s attempts to shut down the encampment and deny pro-Palestinian students these basic rights.
Throughout the past week, counter-protestors against the Palestinian cause have tormented the Palestinian Solidarity Encampment (PSE), committing illegal violent acts that have put the safety of students in danger. Throughout all this, UCLA has been silent. Last night, this culminated in attacks by outside agitators against the PSE, in which students were harassed using tear gas, fireworks, pepper spray, bear mace, as well as physical violence levered through metal and wooden rods. The response Gene Block and the UCLA administration put out in response to these attacks is insufficient to describe the horror of what happened, and the responsibility they share in the wounds the PSE sustained last night. Their lack of action at a time of gross violence proves their complacency in this violence. This oversight is even more stark given that pro-Palestinian, Muslim, Arab-American, and Palestinian students at UCLA have not been given the same support from the administration.
Pacific Ties and its Editorial Board condemn antisemitism in regards to the threats and violence conducted towards UCLA Jewish students, while simultaneously condemning the seventy-year Israeli occupation of Palestine and its supporters. Many members from Pacific Ties come from diasporic communities in the Global South affected by US-sponsored imperialism and violence, and wholeheartedly condemn the U.S.’s role in facilitating the genocide in Gaza, as well as UCLA’s. We would like to reiterate the PSE’s demands to divest, disclose, abolish policing, end the silence, and boycott.
We stand in solidarity with the PSE and encampments at other universities across the United States and the world. Our responsibility as an APIDA-based student newsmagazine is to stand strong with our fellow students and uplift voices that continue to be suppressed by oppressive mainstream media.
Perspective of Pacific Ties’ Editorial Board.
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