Pro-Palestinian protesters reportedly firebombed “the side of a building” on the University of California Berkeley (UCB) campus and claimed that students had been “attacked” on another campus.
In a post on Instagram on Thursday, Palestine Action in the United States shared a post from an anonymous user who claimed responsibility for firebombing the side of Koshland Hall, a building at UCB that houses “labs from the Department of Molecular & Cell Biology.”
The post included a screenshot of a notice that had been written by an author, “student intifada,” on the San Francisco Bay Area Independent Media Center website. In the post the author wrote that students at the University of California Los Angeles “were attacked” and in response, anti-Israel protesters “retaliated” by setting off a firebomb on the side of Koshland Hall.
“Not sure what building it even was,” the group added. “Honestly don’t really care. Every single building on the UC Berkeley campus deserves to be incinerated following the UC system’s treatment of student protestors. Last night they attacked a young woman student who was speaking her mind on a megaphone. So we unloaded a firebomb on the side of a campus building. The flame was big and spread across the trees and bushes on the side of a building.”
Officers from the University of California Police Department (UCPD) began an investigation regarding the alleged use of arson at UCB’s campus, according to Kron4 News.
“Long live the student intifada for Palestine liberation,” the post continued. “Stop the genocide now. UC System must divest from Israel or face our wrath of revenge. Blessed is the flame.”
The Jerusalem Post noted that the post from the “student intifada” author mentioned that a “student with a megaphone” was attacked. However, Students for Justice in Palestine at UCLA (SJP UCLA) reportedly confirmed that she had been “later released.”
The manifesto referred to a Students for Justice in Palestine UCLA student with a megaphonne who had been seized by police, but later released, according to SJP UCLA.
Both SJP UCLA and the UCPD reportedly stated that “anti-Israel activists had attempted” to re-establish an anti-Israel encampment at UCLA.
“They attempted twice, each time being dispersed by police for restricting public movement and disturbing nearby exams, before police and protesters finally clashed,” the outlet reported. “UCLA Associate Vice Chancellor for Campus Safety Rick Braziel said in a statement Tuesday that some students had missed finals because of the encampments, and others had to be moved mid-examination.”
The outlet added that Rick Braziel, the Associate Vice Chancellor for Campus Safety at UCLA, stated that there had been “at least six injuries to UCPD personnel and other safety officers,” as a result of attacks from protesters.
“One security guard was left with his head bleeding after he was struck with an object,” Braziel said in a statement. “Simply put, these acts of non-peaceful protest are abhorrent and cannot continue.”
Braziel added in his statement that 27 people had been arrested.
This comes after anti-Israel protesters at UCB took over a building on May 15, hours after university administrators and protesters came to an agreement to end a weeks-long encampment. Protesters involved in the takeover of the building were reportedly not part of the group that struck an agreement with administrators.
On May 16, 12 anti-Israel protesters were arrested after a new encampment had been established.
Breitbart News reached out to the University of California Berkeley for a statement but did not receive a response by the time of publication.
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