Seven anti-Israel demonstrators arrested for disrupting University of Wisconsin regents meeting
Pro-Palestine protesters interrupted a University of Wisconsin Board of Regents meeting on June 6, demanding that the UW System divest from Israel.
The protest was organized by the UW-Milwaukee 'Popular University for Palestine,' which reportedly also led the encampment that was established on UW-Milwaukee’s campus.
Anti-Israel protesters interrupted a University of Wisconsin Board of Regents meeting on June 6, demanding that the UW System divest from Israel. Seven demonstrators were reportedly arrested during the disruption.
The protest was organized by the UW-Milwaukee “Popular University for Palestine,” which also previously led the encampment that was established on UW-Milwaukee’s campus.
The UW-Milwaukee “Popular University for Palestine” group describes itself in its Instagram bio as “[s]tudents, alumni, faculty, staff, & community organizers calling on @uwmilwaukee to end all ties with the apartheid, settler-colonial state of Israel.”
During a Regents Business and Finance Committee meeting, around 12 protesters began chanting against the “colonial apartheid regime of Israel.”
“Over 40,000 people have been killed by weapons supplied by the U.S., bought by U.S. dollars,” one protestor said. “Not another nickel! Not another dime! No more money for Israel’s crime.”
UW-Milwaukee spokesperson Angelica Duria reportedly said that although students have the right to free speech, they do not have the right to be disruptive.
“UWM respects and supports people’s right to free speech and to engage in peaceful demonstrations,” Duria told The Daily Cardinal. “However, attendees were made aware that disruptions risked violating state law and could result in arrests.”
The Popular University for Palestine took to Instagram to celebrate the protest at the regents’ meeting later that day.
“On the morning of Thursday, June 6th, members of the UW-Milwaukee Popular University for Palestine coalition attended and disrupted the business and finance committee open session of the June UW System Board of Regents meeting,” the group stated. “The purpose of this disruption was to renew our calls for accountability and representation of student voices on the topic of UW System’s [sic] complicity in the genocide happening in occupied Palestine.”
“Officers read a citation letter issued to members, stating they violated university policies and were thereby banned from the student union for the rest of June,” the Popular University for Palestine continued on Instagram. “Protestors were then released. Our current understanding is that the rulings in the letter are the extent of disciplinary action being taken against our students, but we have reason to believe that further action may arise.”
“Our demand for disclosure and divestment of all financial and academic ties to the Zionist occupier ‘Israel’ remains the same, be it UWM, UWM Foundation, or the Greater UW Board of Regents,” the group concluded. “Until this demand is met by UW-Milwaukee and the Greater UW System, the student movement will constantly remind UW administration and the Board of Regents of this reality.”
Campus Reform has contacted the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.
