Two San Francisco College Encampments Join Call for Ceasefire

There’s a thin bit of cord that surrounds a smattering of tents and people, older and younger alike, while the sound of hammers pounding tent nails rings in the air. A soccer ball goes back and forth between campers wearing keffiyehs and a Palestinian flag whips in the evening wind. More and more tents rise on University of San Francisco’s Welch Field like torches in a dim cave.

It’s Monday, April 29 and the first night of the student encampment at the University of San Francisco (USF) and San Francisco State University (SFSU). The faculty and students at the two San Francisco colleges, supported by the local Party for Socialism & Liberation (PSL) chapter, have now joined the international movement calling for a ceasefire in the ongoing destruction of Gaza by Israel. In the United States, these student occupations began about two weeks ago at Columbia University in New York; now, according to the Associated Press, more than 20 colleges throughout the country have seen major uprisings.

Student organizer Susu says the USF demonstration began around 1 p.m. after a weekend of collaborating amongst numerous student groups. The demands of the encampment, meaning the conditions under which they will peacefully end their protest, are:

1. The university condemning Israel’s occupation and genocide of Palestine

2. Disclosing Israeli-affiliated endowments and investments

3. To ensure divestment of those affiliations after disclosure

4. Ending academic partnerships with Israel

5. Protecting pro-Palestinian speech and students on campus.

“The school has done an inadequate job,” Susu says. “Three statements but not one that mentions the horrific acts brought upon the Palestinian people.”

Following the October 7, 2023 attack by Hamas upon Israel, what is now called the Israel-Hamas War has cost at least 34,535 Palestinian lives, including more than 14,500 children and 8,400 women with more than 77,704 injured, according to the Gaza Healthy Ministry. That stacks up alongside about 1,139 lives lost in Israel and at least 8,730 wounded, also according to the Gaza Health Ministry. Activism has sprouted throughout the Bay Area to end the mostly-one-sided fighting, including protestors delaying war ships headed to the region and disrupting a dinner at Rockridge restaurant Acre for Mike Wirth, CEO at Chevron which ships oil to keep the tanks rolling through homes in the West Bank. These encampments mark the first time the nation-wide student protest hit the city this year. Fitting given SFSU’s rich history of international activism, often considered to have sparked in 1968. 

So far at USF college faculty have made no indication they plan to brutalize the protestors like those at Columbia, Emerson College, and more; the AP reports over 1,000 arrests have been made of protestors exercising their first amendment rights. Susu says a representative from the college stopped by to make contact, praising the student leaders for a well-executed demonstration. Numerous professors and faculty are in vocal support of the protest as well. “We want to center the issues happening around the world,” Susu says. “People are dying and hurting.”