Demonstrators retreat along University Boulevard in a cloud of tear gas and taking hits from pepper balls as several area law enforcement agencies use chemical ammunition to clear an encampment of pro-Palestinian demonstrators off the University of Arizona campus Thursday night.

 Kelly Presnell photos, Arizona Daily Star

University of Arizona President Robert C. Robbins urged β€œa welcoming and safe environment” for graduation celebrations this weekend, hours after police again fired pepper balls and tear gas to clear an anti-Israeli-war protest camp at UA and demonstrators threw bottles at SWAT vehicles.

Two people affiliated with the university were arrested as officers broke up the unauthorized encampment overnight Thursday, said UA spokesperson Mitch Zak. He said no injuries were reported.

Protest organizers with the group Students Against Apartheid, without providing names, said the two arrestees are UA faculty members who joined others in holding signs saying β€œKeep Students Safe” in front of the camp β€œto provide protection against potential police violence.” They said police also again fired rubber bullets, as Robbins previously confirmed they did in clearing a camp from UA on May 1.

UA officials said in a written statement late Thursday that enforcement actions were taken after β€œpolice vehicles have been spiked, and rocks and water bottles have been thrown at officers and university staff.”

Asked Friday whether police again used rubber bullets, among other questions, Zak told the Arizona Daily Star the UA was not confirming details beyond the two arrests.

It was the second time in nine days that officers in tactical gear moved in to clear an encampment, both times near the UA Main Gate, after Robbins ordered β€œa zero-tolerance approach” to enforcing campus-use policy β€œto protect the campus, students, faculty, visitors and university events.”

β€œI know that this decision may provoke strong opinions and perhaps questions, including any impact on graduation celebrations planned for today and this weekend,” Robbins wrote Friday in an email to students, faculty, staff and others. β€œCommencement and other ceremonies will go forward as planned.

β€œThe University successfully held 15 convocations and celebrations without any incident on Thursday, while ensuring the safety of all attendees, including 1,800 leaving a convocation at Centennial Hall just steps away from the encampment,” he wrote.

An officer fires a chemical ammunition round into a cluster of demonstrators while clearing an encampment of pro-Palestinian demonstrators off the University of Arizona campus overnight Thursday.

β€œThere are significant world challenges in this moment in time, and ... I value our community’s engagement with these and other matters of consequence. I ask that we extend to one another the same compassion that motivates that engagement, even as we experience disagreement," Robbins said. "However, we will remain steadfast in enforcing our campus rules, which are designed to allow for free expression and to protect the operation of our campus and those within it."Β 

Protesters, advocating β€œthe liberation of Palestine” and demonstrating against Israel’s actions in its war with Hamas in Gaza, used tents, furniture and barricades to create the encampment, of an estimated 60 people, starting about 5 p.m. Thursday, defying policies ordered by RobbinsΒ requiring permits for any large gatherings on campus.

Demonstrators lock arms after retreating out of their encampment as law enforcement officers push them down Park Avenue and off the University of Arizona campus Thursday night.Β 

Robbins announced that rule after an earlier pro-Palestinian encampment ended about 2 a.m. May 1 with officers firing rubber bullets at protesters, including students, and making four arrests for trespassing after about 30 activists violated the 10:30 p.m. campus curfew for non-academic activity. Robbins said officers β€œwere assaulted with projectiles.”

Thursday’s protest group marched shortly after 4 p.m. from Tucson’s Catalina Park to the olive grove on campus next to Main Gate near Park Avenue.

The group was led by faculty and staff carrying signs with the new β€œKeeping Students Safe” slogan.

β€œI felt such intense anger at seeing this happen to students last week,” a non-tenure-track professor in the College of Education told the Star. She would not give her name, saying she fears retaliation from the university.

An organizer speaks to pro-Palestinian protesters gathered at the olive grove on the University of Arizona campus Thursday.Β 

Several hundred faculty members and graduate students signed and sent letters to Robbins last week denouncing his response, and the law enforcement use of force, to the April 30-May 1 encampment. β€œWe the undersigned are writing in horror, dismay and anger in reaction to your decision to call the police on our own students who were peacefully protesting,” said a petition circulating among the general faculty.

Harlow Parkin, a first-year UA student and a member of Students Against Apartheid, said he was hit in the head that night by a rubber bullet and suffered a concussion.

Thursday night, one student protester told the demonstrators, β€œAfter a week of calm, let tonight be a reminder.”

Once at their on-campus site, the protesters quickly erected wooden pallets, which they drilled together and tied with plastic zip ties. Next to the pallets they assembled tents, which are directly against university policy. The tents were surrounded by the wooden wall and by protesters, some of whom were staff and faculty. Bikes were also used as a form of fencing, and furniture was hauled in.

While all of this was going on Thursday evening, students, some wearing graduation gowns, and their families were walking by. The university has many graduation ceremonies occurring this week; the main undergraduate ceremony was set to take place Friday night at Arizona Stadium.

At 7:15 Thursday, a university official gave the campers their first warning of the night. She was met with boos.

β€œWe’re not leaving until Gaza is free,” one organizer with a bullhorn shouted, to cheers.

A line of several area law enforcement agencies stands at the intersection of University Boulevard and Park Avenue after ejecting a small group of pro-Palestinian demonstrators off the University of Arizona campus overnight Thursday.

β€œI am absolutely willing to get arrested for this,” said a protester who would not give his last name, but said he is a second-year UA graduate student named Max. β€œWe are on the right side of this issue.”

He said UA officials are ignoring the protesters’ demands that the university divest from Israel. The university β€œhas hundreds of millions invested,” he said. β€œIt would be incredibly simple to cease those.”

Group members unloaded shields and helmets from a van as they were setting up. In a message to their followers, they included an β€œurgent supply list” including food, tables, tarps, chargers, water jugs and lights. Others dragged university barricades over from Main Gate to fortify their camp.

UA facilities workers tried to erect floodlights at the encampment but left after protesters surrounded them, chanting, and began shaking a golf cart carrying workers.

A reporter saw a rock thrown toward an officer and a protester spit at an officer.

The Tucson Police Officers Association wrote on Facebook last week that after the earlier encampment, β€œSeveral TPD officers were assaulted with bottles and other objects, kicked, and spit on. This is beyond unacceptable and we will continue to advocate for every single person involved in the camp to be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”

A member of the April 30-May 1 encampment who serves as a media liaison refused to answer questions from the Star or give a statement about the throwing of objects at officers.

UA police and employees issued a second warning to protesters at 9:30 Thursday night, telling them to clear out. Warnings were ignored, UA officials said later in their statement.

β€œA line of what appeared to be over 100” officers from UA Police and other agencies, β€œequipped with shields, chemical agents and weapons,” moved in on the encampment about midnight, deploying rubber bullets, tear gas, flash bangs and "intimidation tactics," Students Against Apartheid said in a written statement Friday. They quoted an unnamed College of Education faculty member as saying some officers were also "brandishing nightsticks."

Robbins wrote last week to the university community: β€œWhile freedom of speech and free expression are encouraged at our university, we will not allow students, faculty, staff, or outside agitators to violate the law or our policies and put anyone at risk.”

He said β€œa minimal use of pepper balls and rubber bullets” was warranted to disperse the May 1 crowd and for officers to protect themselves and others, and that he was thankful there weren't reports of significant injuries.

Faculty members countered in a letter to Robbins they circulated later in the week: β€œUnder the cloak of enforcing a legal curfew, you violated not only the primary directive of caring for students in your charge but also turned a peaceful protest into a violent confrontation.”

Separate petitions criticizing Robbins’ orders were written by general faculty, the School of Government and Public Policy, and the Center for Latin American Studies. β€œWe are appalled by the disproportionate use of force against peaceful demonstrators including the use of rubber bullets, chemical irritants and arrests,"Β the School of Government letter said.Β 

Zak, the UA spokesperson, said β€œthe university supports free and open expression of ideas consistent with established campus policies. We appreciate that there are strong views, understand that some faculty disagree with our response, and respect their right to voice concerns.”

Protest organizers with Students Against Apartheid, who would not give their full names, said via Instagram the group is demanding that UA:

Release a public statement β€œcondemning Israel’s genocidal campaign” and calling for an immediate and permanent ceasefire;

Disclose all financial connections to Israel and weapons manufacturing, including Raytheon;

Divest from all companies β€œprofiting from the occupation of Palestine, the genocide of people in the Gaza strip and the militarization of the US/Mexico borderlands/unceded O’odham and Pascua Yaqui territories”;

β€œDemilitarize campus” by defunding the UA Police Department to redirect all resources β€œtowards care and justice.”

Pro-Palestinian protestors at the University of Arizona retreat after arrests.

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Reporter Ellie Wolfe covers higher education for the Arizona Daily Star and Tucson.com. Contact: ewolfe@tucson.com. Follow her on X @elliew0lfe.

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