Welcome to the Chronicle of the UCSD Gaza Solidarity Encampment. On May 1, 2024 students established the UCSD Gaza Solidarity Encampment in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza experiencing genocide and to protest UCSD's complicity in the genocide and the occupation of Palestine. This web site presents a living history of the Encampment and supporting media.
You can explore Version 1.0 of the Chronicle either by reading the text, starting at this overview. Or you can move through the multi-media summary of the Chronicle given below.
The Chronicle is a living document. We are actively working on Version 1.1. To contribute stories, photos, videos or other media, please visit our Participate page.
What was It Like at the Encampment? The UCSD Gaza Solidarity Encampment was set up by students as a way of collectively circumventing prevailing fear and organizing to address UCSD's complicity in the violence. The Encampment was a life-affirming, community-forming, cross-cultural, multi-faith space of learning, teaching, research, protest and mutual aid. The community learned about UCSD's ties to the genocide and the history of occupation, apartheid, resistance and resilience in Palestine. Read More in the Introduction, Stories and Timeline.
Settler-Colonial Universities Did you know that universities in Israel and all campuses of the University of California are Land grab universities, located on stolen Land, the result of settler colonialism? Read More in Contexts.
How did the History of Protest at UCSD Provide Context for the Encampment? Five major protests, three of them with encampments and all that formally broke university rules, helped to define UCSD and its relationship to the struggle against injustice on campus and across the globe: the Anti-Apartheid protests of 1985, the Women's Resource Center Encampment of 1992, the Black Winter occupations and protests of 2010, the Free the Nippple protest of 2015 and the Grad Student Strike and Khoslaville Encampment of 2022. Read More in Contexts
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Anti-Apartheid Encampment (1985): Divest!
Anti-Apartheid Encampment (1985): Whites Only Regents
Anti-Apartheid Encampment (1985): Winnie Mandela Library/Galbraith Hall
Black Winter (2010): 3/4 Library Walk Rally
Black Winter (2010): Chancellor Fox Dialogues with Students
Black Winter (2010): Chancellor's Office Occupation
Black Winter (2010): Teach Out!
Free the Nipple (2015)
Free the Nipple (2015): My Body
Grad Student Strike (2022)
Grad Student Strike (2022): Khoslaville Encampment
UCSD Gaza Solidarity Encampment (2024): Demands
Women's Resource Center Encampment (1992): Out of Touch Admin
What is the Palestine Exception to Free Speech? The Palestine Exception to Free Speech is a pattern of behaviors that selectively represses anti-genocide, anti-occupation, anti-apartheid speech and organizing in support of a free Palestine.Read More in Contexts.
Art from the Encampment Passersby and onlookers were greeted with dozens of lovingly designed signs and banners that were placed at the perimeter of the encampment and against tents. Signs carried clear messages of the deeply held beliefs, some explicitly religious, of the students to end the violence in Gaza. The signs were a living reminder of the hearts and minds of students who had joined a nationwide movement to stop killing and death in Gaza. Their messages reflected a love for all. Read More in Stories
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Gaza Solidarity Encampment (2024): From Palestine to the Philippines
Gaza Solidarity Encampment (2024): Kids for Cease Fire
Gaza Solidarity Encampment (2024): Liberated Zone
Gaza Solidarity Encampment (2024): Never Forget
Gaza Solidarity Encampment (2024): None of Us Is Safe
What was Happening in Gaza During the Encampment? IOF bombings targeting children, murders of journalists, the ground invasion of Rafah, and the struggles of Palestinians for survival, coping and joy all are characteristic of Gaza during the Encampment. Read More in Timeline.
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Students in Gaza thank students establishing Gaza Solidarity Encampments
Children in Gaza Continue to Play in Defiance of the Unfolding Genocide
Rescuers Dig Baby Juri out of the Rubble of a House Destroyed by Israeli Warplanes
Palestinian Abducted by IOF Testifies to Beatings, Torture and Humiliation in Detention Camps
Dabke by Children in Nuseirat Refugee Camp
Mustafa Sells Water to Buy Prosthetic Legs to Replace Those Lost in IOF Bombing
Remembering Saeed al-Taweel, a Palestinian Journalist Murdered in Gaza City
Farah Miqdad, Whose Brothers were Martyred, Sells Clothes to Support her Family
Haneen Hamdouna Fears Identifying as Press Because the IOF Targets Journalists
Palestinians Drown Retrieving Food Aid Off Gaza Beach
Journalist Salem Abu Toyour and His Child Ahmad Killed by IOF airstrike
Engineer Ahmed Receives Prosthetic lLmbs to Replace Legs Lost in IOF Bombing
Ground Invasion of Rafah Begins
Families Fleeing Rafah in Advance of IOF Ground Assault
Israelis Destroy Aid Trucks Meant for Gaza in the West Bank and Celebrate
Interfaith, Intercultural Encampment Contrary to misrepresentations by senior administration, the Encampment was a peaceful, communal space that promoted cross-cultural understanding, including prayers and services for those of the Muslim, Jewish and Christian Faiths. Read more in Stories and Timeline.
Today marks Day 207 of Israel's genocide on Gaza. Zionist forces have relentlessly attacked Gaza for 207 days on end, without pause or interruption, to fulfill the promise Israel made to the world: that it would raze Gaza to the ground, that it would slaughter Palestinians like "human animals," that it would inflict a second Nakba... Our struggle for Palestinian liberation continues as we now join student encampments across the world demanding that our universities divest billions of dollars from weapons manufacturers and companies that enable and profit from Israel's ongoing genocide, apartheid, and occupation of Palestine. There is no "time, place or manner" while Israel continues to escalate its genocidal assault on the 1.4 million Palestinians packed into Rafah and its surrounding makeshift tent cities. Now, more than ever before, we must rise together in solidarity to demand an end to this U.S.-backed genocide, and UCSD's complicity in human rights abuses and war crimes against the Palestinian people. -- Students for Justice in Palestine at UC San Diego | I think for a lot of students, it was their first time experimenting with what critical people power was like. And so for a lot of folks, I think there was excitement; there was energy that was really healthy in many ways. – Husayn | I feel like both my identities, being queer and being Jewish, are being weaponized right now to justify what is going on in Palestine. And i want to make it very clear that Judaism is inextricably linked with freedom from oppression. It's not in spite of my Judaism that i believe in a free Palestine, but rather because of it. –Skylar | We firmly support the people of Palestine who face a calculated genocide executed by the Israeli Occupation Forces... We denounce America’s billions of tax dollars that fund this ongoing genocide through weapons packages labeled as “aid. We denounce UC San Diego’s investment in weapons manufacturers such as Lockheed Martin and Raytheon. There must be a UC where our tuition, learning, and research ensures collective, international liberation. -- UC San Diego Food Cooperative, General Store Cooperative, KSDT Radio, Che Cafe Collective, and Groundworks Books Collective. | “I was immensely proud of the amount of work that people were putting into this. I think it’s very apparent when someone actually has a passion and actually cares about something; they put that amount of energy into it, and they put themselves into the effort. Watching students do this for the first time, I was very proud of how they were handling it.” – Husayn | What can we do to make sure people don’t forget, so all of this doesn’t get washed to the side? … I hope that people find a way to keep fighting.” – Jordan | It's so absurd ow quickly everything went back to normal... they really did a good job of gaslighting us into thinking it didn't happen. - Bartholomew | I’ve never seen a protest so quiet; it was really just more of like … straight up a community. In like zombie movies, when they run into a shelter or something, and it’s just a bunch of tents, and it’s a community. … That’s deadass what it felt like. Nothing was violent.” – Mike | Seeing all of the other campus protests all over the country inspired me to come when UCSD had one. – Pikachu | SJP and JVP remain firm in our stance that there can be no business as usual in the midst of a genocide. -- Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace at UC San Diego
"The students are very strongly motivated to try to do something after they have watched the 7- month-long Israeli onslaught of Gaza, where every plane and helicopter and every bomb and shell are made in the US and often paid for by US taxpayers. The students in the encampment were Palestinian, Arab, Muslim, Jewish, White, Black, Asian, Latinx, queer and straight. This movement of students, which is now a worldwide movement, is demanding that universities divest from their financial interests and academic ties to the State of Israel, and the movement is more broadly bringing political pressure in the US to change policy. We agree with what Professor Rashid Khalidi of Columbia University said – “This is the conscience of a nation, speaking through your kids”, and he linked the current encampments with similar student movements against the Vietnam War and Apartheid in South Africa. We recognize the courage and commitment of the students who camped out. We wish our administrators would have some empathy for what it is like to be in their shoes: sleeping in an encampment, worrying about classes, midterms, suspension, and – given the happenings at UCLA – the possibility of attack and physical harm." – Testimony of 246 UCSD Faculty
"As for the camp itself, we saw a different space than the one described. It was safe, secure, and joyous. The students had areas for food and prayer. The grounds were cleaned. The nights were tranquil and reflective. Movement along Library Walk flowed. When the walkway was momentarily blocked, it was for song or dance. There were no checkpoints other than watchful administrative personnel." – Members of the UC San Diego Writing Community
"Protest is essential to our democracy and a basic human right and retaliation against students who protest is antithetical to our university’s highest ideals of learning and scholarship. The militarized response has only chilled free speech, escalated tensions, reduced safety on campus, and destroyed the trust needed for negotiations and shared governance." – San Diego Faculty Association
"The weapons police bring onto campuses inevitably lead to escalation and grievous injury, or worse, and have no place at educational institutions. Moreover, police presence does not make students feel safer--on the contrary, the arrival of police heightens community tensions, worsens relations among community members, and is a chilling act of repression and censorship. The police presence on campus advertises to the world, including parents and prospective students, that UCSD responds to conscientious, peaceful student dissent with clubs rather than dialogue. The Ethnic Studies department supports the demands outlined by Students for Justice in Palestine and unequivocally condemns today's attacks by the administration and the San Diego County Sheriffs Department and the California Highway Patrol." – Ethnic Studies Department Faculty
"On Wednesday, May 1, protesters formed a peaceful encampment adjacent to Library Walk, the heart of campus, that was carefully designed so as not to obstruct free movement between and among university facilities. Within the encampment, students and others organized peaceful protest activities, teach-ins, calls to prayer, Shabbat services, and other activities that demonstrated their insistence on a community of protest defined by inclusion and nonviolence. Faculty have been in regular contact with students at the encampment since it was first established, participating to varying degrees in their educational activities. Despite the multiple channels of open and available communication, upper administration nonetheless unilaterally chose a set of actions – summoning multiple heavily-armed law enforcement agencies, the last and most extreme option – rather than an approach that would have been defined by de-escalation, dialogue, and mutual respect." – Department of Communication Faculty
What were News Media Saying About the Encampment? Read more in Stories and Timeline.
How did the senior administration Use Racist and anti-Muslim Tropes to Manufacture Consent for the Violent Dismantlement of the Encampment? Read more in 'Fact Sheet'.
"When they put me in cuffs, what immediately came to mind was the mass graves that they found in Gaza, people who were found wearing the exact same cuffs that were found dead and buried there. So I wasn’t scared of anything that police or school could do to me because it’s nothing in comparison to what other people are currently experiencing — what the martyrs in Palestine experienced before they died." – Millian | "Today’s events directly contradict what we teach, including the rich history of activism at UCSD, which has long been celebrated as a beacon of social change and progress. The actions taken by the administration stand in stark contrast to these values, undermining the very ethos of our institution and betraying the legacy of those who have fought tirelessly to make UCSD a place where activism is not only welcomed but celebrated." – UC San Diego Graduate Students | "We are especially troubled by administration’s repeated turn to 'safety,' including language in Chancellor Khosla's May 5th email, to justify retaliation against students. His claim that encampment activities are 'dangerous' and pose a safety concern stand in contrast to mainstream media descriptions of the campus protest." – San Diego Faculty Association | "When the sliding doors opened and we heard the crowd, it made me feel like I wasn't alone. In my experience being arrested, in my struggle against police, and in my struggle for a free Palestine, just that indescribable feeling of solidarity. It was that feeling of solidarity in is purest form, when people came out in solidarity with us and the cause." – Willy | "Although the campus was essentially closed down to students, staff, and faculty on the morning of May 6 with very little notice, the media were present to document the police response, situating themselves primarily behind a line of officers clad in riot gear. News cameras appeared to have been given unfettered access to the scene, often moving freely among mobilized police officers while protesters were cordoned off into separate areas. In addition, after protesters were cleared from the encampment, local media were permitted to roam through the area, broadcasting their own perusal of personal belongings and other materials... Police appeared to selectively remove items of clothing from the students; most notably, in several instances visible on local media’s news streams, police were seen deliberately and roughly removing keffiyehs from around protesters’ necks, which they then dropped to the ground and trampled." – UC San Diego Department of Communication Faculty | "Can nobody see what’s going on? Is nobody gonna stand up for us? I thought of the kids in Gaza. So this is what it’s like to live in a camp, except we have a ton of resources and community support. So imagine what it’s like living in a camp without those things. And then you’re standing in front of the police, and you’re like, now imagine your mom is 10 feet under the rubble." – Sunflower | "We demand the immediate resignation of Chancellor Khosla. His actions this morning placed hundreds of students in danger at the hands of aggressive, militantly organized police and resulted in arrests and injuries; violated the constitutional rights of our students to peacefully assemble and protest; and demonstrated a level of hostility against our students that has absolutely no place among University leadership... We demand police be removed from campus immediately and permanently. UCPD, San Diego County Sheriffs, California Highway Patrol, and all other police have no place on the UC San Diego campus and should never be called upon to surveil, repress, and threaten our students." – UC San Diego Ethnic Studies Department Faculty
"Good morning from Gaza. Good morning from Shuhada Al-Aqsa Hospital... People are treated as a herd of sheep that is being herded by a shepherd who has no mercy whatsoever and who is dictating whatever he wants or she wants, because they have the ultimate power to do things, and they have the ultimate power to destroy anything they want, with the most sophisticated technology they have been using. Mothers are killed with their sons. Fathers are killed with their daughters and sons, whole families wiped out, and even now in Rafah area, in the east, west, south now and north in Rafah. In the Gaza south area, in the Gaza north area, in the Gaza central area, nonstop bombardment. And people who were asked to leave Rafah are now in Gaza central area or in Khan Younis, and they are still seeing with their own eyes — I mean, again, the lucky ones who are surviving the bombardments are seeing with their own eyes that there is no safe haven in Gaza Strip. Death is the one major risk enveloping the lives of the people of Gaza" – Akram Al-Satarri | "Mere statements alone are insufficient to halt the invasion of Rafah or address Israel’s genocidal military campaign against Palestinians in Gaza. What is urgently required are tangible, decisive actions. Our organizations urgently implore the international community to take immediate and decisive action, utilizing all available means, to prevent further atrocities, including applying and imposing economic sanctions, arms embargo, and other countermeasures until Israel adheres to its obligations under international law. Lastly, we once again urge the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) to immediately issue arrest warrants for every member of the Israeli war cabinet, who are deemed responsible for orchestrating the ongoing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza." – The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights, Al Mezan and Al-Haq | "The Israeli military’s “evacuation orders” are unlawful and amount to forcible transfer, a grave violation of international humanitarian law (IHL)... The Israeli military ground invasion of Rafah is disrupting the humanitarian response, in breach of the UN Security Council resolutions 2720 and 2728 as well as the International Court of Justice’s provisional measures ordering Israel to enable the provision of basic services and humanitarian assistance... Every hour during which Israeli forces occupy the crossings of Rafah and Kerem Shalom / Karm Abu Salem condemns more Palestinians to starvation and denial of medical care." – Amnesty International and 19 Other NGOs | "The graphic images and cell phone video recordings that have been circulating on social media — a headless child, charred bodies of children, women and children frantically running in all directions trying to escape the fires — are painful to watch. They bring Israeli atrocities in Gaza to a new level of unspeakable cruelty and horror.I don’t know how anyone can recover from this gruesome monstrosity. Do we mourn the dead infants or weep for those who have just been orphaned? Do we scream for those children who have been maimed, or for the parents who had to wrap their loved ones in white shrouds?" | Michael Mourshabeck | "Judges at the top United Nations court ordered Israel to halt its offensive in the southern Gaza city of Rafah and withdraw from the enclave, in a case brought by South Africa accusing Israel of genocide, citing 'immense ris'” to the Palestinian population... Friday’s decision marked the third time this year the 15-judge panel has issued preliminary orders seeking to rein in the death toll and alleviate humanitarian suffering in Gaza. While orders are legally binding, the court has no police to enforce them... Israel must 'immediately halt its military offensive, and any other action in the Rafah Governorate, which may inflict on the Palestinian group in Gaza conditions of life that could bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part,' [Nawaf] Salam said, and called the humanitarian situation in Rafah 'disastrous'" – Al Jazeera Staff | "'The Commission finds that Israel is responsible for the commission of genocide in Gaza,' said Navi Pillay, Chair of the Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel]. 'It is clear that there is an intent to destroy the Palestinians in Gaza through acts that meet the criteria set forth in the Genocide Convention... Explicit statements by Israeli civilian and military authorities and the pattern of conduct of the Israeli security forces indicate that the genocidal acts were committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, Palestinians in the Gaza Strip as a group.'" – UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel | "Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip... The assault on Palestinians in Gaza cannot be separated from the escalating violence being inflicted, at varying levels and in different forms, on Palestinians living under Israeli rule in the West Bank and within Israel. The violence and destruction in these areas is intensifying over time, with no effective domestic or international mechanism acting to halt them. We warn of the clear and present danger that the genocide will not remain confined to the Gaza Strip, and that the actions and underlying mindset driving it may be extended to other areas as well. The recognition that the Israeli regime is committing genocide in the Gaza Strip, and the deep concern that it may expand to other areas where Palestinians live under Israeli rule, demand urgent and unequivocal action from both Israeli society and the international community, and use of every means available under international law to stop Israel’s genocide against the Palestinian people." – B'Tselem
Accountability? The senior administration and the UC Regents have insisted that students and faculty arrested at UC Encampments be held 'accountable' through seemingly endless disciplinary processes. When will Chancellor Khosla and the senior administration responsible for implementing the Palestine Exception at UCSD be held accountable for their actions? For their material and discursive support for genocide? For their suppression of speech about Palestine and the genocide? For their violent reaction to the UCSD Gaza Solidarity Encampment - an entirely peaceful protest well within the tradition of protest at UCSD? For their unlawful use of university funds to pursue their political agenda and the agendas of their donors and political allies? For their despicable contribution to the hateful environment that produced the Islamic Center of San Diego shooting and will produce further racist violence that is sure to occur in the future? Read More in Contexts.
