On Thursday, April 11, Pomona College faculty passed a resolution drafted in support of the 20 students arrested on April 5, criticizing the college for calling the police and suspending the students. The vote passed with 92 for, 39 against and 4 abstaining, adding up to a total of 135 votes recorded.
“The faculty condemns the present and future militarization and use of police on the campus,” the resolution read. “It insists that the College immediately drop criminal charges and reverse the suspensions and all related consequences against student protesters for their actions of civil disobedience.”
Several faculty members created the resolution on April 7, which was discussed in a faculty meeting the following day. Due to procedural reasons pertaining to Robert’s Rules of Order and brought to light by faculty, a vote on the resolution could not occur during the April 7 meeting.
As the faculty meeting took place in Pomona’s Edmunds Ballroom on April 11, at 1:25 p.m. over 250 — and at its peak around 400 — 7C students and community members participated in a walkout in support of the arrested students and calling for Pomona’s divestment from “the apartheid state in Israel.”
Protestors gathered at various meetup spots around the 5Cs before walking to the courtyard of Honnold-Mudd Library. Members from Pomona Divest from Apartheid (PDfA), the group that organized the walkout, stood against the library at the front of the crowd.
Organizers passed out masks — warning people to keep one on at all times — while attendees carried photo cutouts of Pomona College President Gabrielle G. Starr and Pomona’s Board of Trustees members and signs reading phrases such as “IOF, CPD they’re all the same,” and “This is what the ruling class has decided will be normal -Aaron Bushnell.”
As the crowd grew, protestors chanted statements such as “Divestment is our demand, no peace on stolen land,” before students, some who were arrested on April 5, and others representing PDfA spoke. Each speaker stepped up to an elevated platform where a microphone and speakers helped them reach the entire walkout crowd.
One of the arrested students, Analise, described her experience of last Friday’s events.
“Being arrested will not deter me and police power will not deter us,” she said. “It was scary to be in jail, denied our right to a lawyer and a phone call. [But] we could hear your voices chanting outside. It was your power that grounded this arrest in a broader international movement and fight for divestment and Palestinian liberation.”
On the night of their arrests, the students were prevented from seeing their lawyer, James Gutierrez, thought to be because they were not questioned by law enforcement. Another arrested student commented on what she saw as the college’s mishandling of the April 5 demonstration.
“Pomona wants to call us violent and intimidating. They want to call us outside agitators,” Julianna Deibel SC ’24 said. “They want to say they’re maintaining the safety of the community. How does calling in three cities’ worth of cops in full riot gear to arrest and brutalize students keep us safe?”
In a statement released the same day as the arrests, Starr expressed her concern about the safety implications of students’ actions on April 5.
“This occupation was against our policies, but as we have expressed in the past, we work with students who are exercising their right to protest unless that protest impedes on the rights of others,” the statement read. “[Self-identification upon request] is imperative for the safety of our community, especially when these individuals are masked.”
The statement explained that any Pomona students found to be involved in the events that took place on campus Friday would be suspended, and it remains the only of the 5Cs to have instituted suspensions upon arrested students. The college has yet to release a statement on the status of these suspensions.
Deibel shared her feelings toward the colleges in the aftermath of the arrests and suspensions of fellow arrested students.
“I’m supposed to be finishing a thesis right now,” she said. “I can’t focus on anything but rage since Friday. I don’t wanna live or graduate on a campus that has labeled me and my friends as threats to the community.”
At the rally, some students read statements on behalf of the suspended Pomona students who were not allowed on campus. Multiple of the speeches from arrested students or those reading on behalf of arrested students emphasized the need to divert focus away from those arrested and toward efforts for divestment.
“This is not about us, please don’t make this about us,” one student read on behalf of a suspended Pomona student. “This is about divestment, this is about imperialism, this is about mobilizing our community to demand Pomona College’s divestment from the U.S. and Israeli genocide of Palestine.”
Deibel also shared this sentiment, emphasizing that the arrests were a small moment in the larger movement.
“The violence of our arrests by 30 riot cops is nothing compared to the Pomona-funded bombs falling on Gaza every day,” she said. “Any repression we face here pales in comparison to the treatment of the Palestinians at Israeli universities like the University of Haifa.”
The University of Haifa, to which Deibel refers to, was announced to be removed as a pre-approved option for study abroad at Pitzer College April 1.
Other speakers also focused attention away from themselves and the arrests, shifting instead toward Starr, condemning her for her treatment of students of color.
“Black people like Starr are not one of us, they are not with us, they are not our community,” a speaker read from a testimony on behalf of a Black arrested student. “They are fully fledged members of the elite and uphold every system that massacres and genocides our people in the U.S. and abroad. Sure they can change one day when they maybe redistribute their money and start organizing with and for the people but until that day, they are nothing but our literal class and race enemies.”
The testimony also referred to police as the “slave patrol” and called Starr a “race traitor” for facilitating the arrests and suspensions on April 5.
Around 2:45 p.m., one organizer closed out the remarks by calling on students to display a continued protest for divestment.
“Let’s show this murderous institution that it is in fact easier to disclose and divest than it is to coordinate arrest days in advance, charge its own students with trespassing, and deny students campus housing, food, and classes,” the speaker said.
The speaker then led a chant of “Free, free, free Palestine” and directed attendees toward Pomona’s Alexander Hall, the site of last week’s arrests, to conduct a sit-in, scheduled to last 33 minutes to mourn the deaths of the 33,634 people that have been killed by Israel’s ongoing siege of Gaza that began on Oct. 7, 2023.
The crowd of over 250 students, faculty and community members marched from the library and down Sixth Street to College Ave., where the protesters sat outside Alexander Hall, obstructing a portion of the avenue as a few members of Campus Security observed from either side of the building.
Organizers then played audio messages from people currently in Gaza, sharing their experiences living through Israel’s assault.
Following this, at around 3:45 p.m., organizers called on the protesters to march to McConnell Dining Hall at Pitzer College where Pitzer’s College Council would be voting on a resolution calling on the school to hold an academic boycott against the University of Haifa and Israeli Universities.
Throughout the day, students emphasized the importance of such protests and walkouts in sustaining efforts in support of Palestine and divestment.
“We will not be suppressed and we are not scared,” Analise said in front of the library. “We are committing to continuing to disrupt business as usual to resisting surveillance and criminalization and to winning divestment. Pomona is scared and we are powerful. We must continue to fight for a free Palestine.”
Annabelle Ink, Ben Lauren, Ansley Washburn, Elena Townsend-Lerdo and Adam Akins contributed reporting.
This story previously misstated that “Due to procedural reasons set by administration, faculty were not allowed to vote on the resolution in the April 7 meeting.” The procedural reasons were brought to light by faculty, not administration. It has since been updated.
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