Organizers of the solidarity encampment for Palestine at UC Santa Barbara released their demands for the administration.
Demands included responding to a public records request, divesting from weapons manufacturers, abolishing the campus police department, an academic boycott of Israel, and reinvesting resources back into the community.
An anonymous graduate student and media liaison for the encampment told Noozhawk that the encampment looked at the demands from other institutions such as Columbia and UCLA and looked at the local anti-war coalition when they were coming up with demands. The graduate student wished not to be identified because of concerns over doxxing.
According to a post on the Instagram account @ucsbliberatedzone, which listed the encampment’s demands, they are asking that the university respond to public records requests submitted on April 8, 2021, and March 9, 2024.
Specifically, they are asking for copies of all of the university’s contracts with the U.S. Department of Defense. Their demands also call on the university to disclose their investments and partnerships with Raytheon, Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin.
The demands call for the UCSB Police Department to be abolished by the end of the 2024-25 academic year, for UCSBPD to not receive any more funding from the university’s budget, and that officers are no longer issued their on-duty weapons and patrol rifles, and are not permitted to use deadly force.
The graduate student told Noozhawk that they hope abolishing the campus police department would lead to funds being redistributed to help with different kinds of violence response.
“So many times when people call the police they’re not actually looking for an armed militant person; they’re more so just looking for support,” the graduate student said. “It would be great to have all those funds that are being funneled into UCPD, that’s not necessarily productive for a lot of the student body, for that to be placed elsewhere.”
Demands also call on the university to divest from weapons manufacturers, unethical materials and colonial infrastructure.
“We demand responsible and ethical research,” the encampment’s demands read. “We demand that UCSB break partnerships with the Department of Defense and all federal and private military agencies and cease work on militarized applications of research.”
Following their released demands, representatives from the Student Affairs office visited the encampment on Tuesday.
“It was great that they came to say hello and meet us on our grounds, but ultimately, nothing really happened because the folks that they sent were unable to kind of communicate about the demands that we’ve so clearly kind of centered as our the principles of our encampment,” the graduate student told Noozhawk.
According to a news release posted by @ucsbliberatedzone on Instagram, the encampment has been surveilled with “increasing intensity.” The news release claims there have been a half-dozen community service officers at all times, private security, and unmarked and marked UCPD patrol vehicles. The news release claimed that the security presence has increased since representatives from Student Affairs visited the encampment.
“There hasn’t necessarily been any kind of explicit confrontation with extra police presence, but there is definitely a feeling of surveillance,” the graduate student told Noozhawk. “It definitely does feel like something has shifted with the extra layer of security.”
It’s been eight days since the encampment first began, and there are now three lawns from North Hall, also known as Malcolm X Hall, to the library full of tents and signs. Around the lawns are numerous chalk drawings and writings calling for a free Palestine and for the administration to comply with demands. From Ellison Hall to the chemistry building is a death toll marking every Palestinian who has died since Oct. 7.
On Friday, UC Riverside administrators reached an agreement with leaders of the student encampment to be transparent about UC Riverside’s investments and to form a task force to explore the possibility of UCR’s endowment to be removed from the management of the UC Investments Office.
The graduate student said they saw the move as a bureaucratic way for administrators to get the protests to stop.
“We’re really trying to avoid that,” the graduate student said. “We want tangible actions to be done, and I don’t think that we will concede to anything less than full disclosure, full divestment, full demilitarization because that is the root of why we’re here.”
The graduate student said they don’t want a task force or committee that will just fizzle out and lose the momentum of what students at the encampment have started.
So far, the encampment hasn’t provoked any major counter-protests, but the graduate student said they have had a few individuals try to antagonize members of the encampment.
“Our response to that is simply not to have a response,” the graduate student said. “We’re here for the people of Palestine, and we don’t necessarily care to participate or engage in conversations that won’t benefit either of us.”
This weekend, the encampment will have a series of Mother’s Day programming, including a brunch and a vigil for mothers in Palestine. Organizers are inviting students to bring their moms to the encampment and for moms to bring their kids to the encampment. A full schedule of events will be posted by @ucsbliberatedzone on Instagram.
