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A standoff between pro-Palestine and pro-Israel protestors at Cal Poly Humboldt climaxed Monday with a man throwing paint at the pro-Israel activists. 

The protests, held October 7 in the UC quad in the middle of campus, started at around 11 a.m. About six people were set up at a table with signs saying they were Jewish or Israeli, and inviting people to talk to them about the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas attacks on Israel. About 10 were with the pro-Palestine group. Over the next two hours, that number would swell to about 20 people. 

By about 12:30, the pro-Palestine demonstrators were chanting, waving flags and beating a set of bongos when a man wearing a yellow hoodie with a pot full of red liquid showed up. He started using a soup ladle to paint a circle-A “anarchy” symbol on the pavement, then began to fling the liquid at the pro-Israel activists, splattering several of them. People from the pro-Israel crowd were also subjected to name-calling. 

“This represents the blood of Palestinian martyrs, and the blood of students when the cops fucking beat trans[gender] indigenous people last semester!” he said. “The school is trying to erase colonial violence, and we won’t let them!”

He left soon afterwards. The pro-Israel group cleared out at around 3 p.m., and the last of the pro-Palestine group were gone from the quad by about 6 p.m. 

The University Police Department does not show a call for service around this time on the quad, though they did show up for a report of an assault at 4 p.m. Classes in Siemens Hall were moved.

Kira Trinity, one of the activists hit with liquid, said she could get some of it off in the sink, though the shirt she was wearing is ruined. Trinity, a Humboldt alumnus, was there with the “HumJews” organization a campus club to try to share her views on the Israeli occupation of Gaza. When the Palestinian protestors started waving their flags, she left to get her Israeli flag. When she returned, the paint-thrower got her and several of the people she was with. [CORRECTION: “HumJews” is an Instagram account; it is not related to the campus club Trinity was there to support.]

Trinity believes the liquid was likely a kind of watered-down acrylic mixture. 

Community member Oren Nahshon was with HumJews recording the altercation on several cameras in an attempt to document any ill will towards them. Much of his camera equipment was hit with the liquid, as well as all of his clothing. Nahshon said people encouraged the liquid thrower to target him.

“One of them got very close to me and started barking like a dog,” Nahshon said. “He told [the guy with the paint] ‘Don’t waste the paint on the floor, throw it on him.’ So he sprayed the paint on me three times in a row…I’m very happy I was there, because if that’s how they behaved in front of a camera, I’m sure that if the camera was not there, whoever was there talking could have been hurt.”

At least one person has filed a police report. Cal Poly Humboldt sent out a press release yesterday asking for information. 

Political graffiti is becoming an expensive problem for Humboldt. In an email obtained by the Outpost, Director of Facilities Maintenance Travis Fleming claimed it costs over $1,000 every day to clean graffiti, and on one day alone there were 20 complaints filed about Middle East-related messages.

Trinity hopes that the perpetrator gets jail time, and Nahshon said he wants their identity exposed, but on the pro-Palestine side opinions are very different. 

Pro-Palestine activist Jack McCann was protesting in the quad Monday while the man was throwing paint. He doesn’t think the thrower did anything wrong. 

“I am not going to condemn someone who does paint, especially when you know we are trying to call attention to the much more significantly horrific crimes that have been committed and are currently being committed,” McCann said. “You know, a little bit of spilled paint doesn’t seem like that big of a deal in comparison to potentially hundreds of thousands of civilians that have been slaughtered over the past year.”

McCann said though the Jewish people in the quad did not personally kill anyone in Gaza, he thinks they are complicit because they he believes they are advocating genocide. McCann does not sympathize with them, paint or no paint. [UPDATE, 4:53 p.m.: McCann just called the Outpost with a clarification: He said that he believes that everyone is complicit, not just the Jewish people on the quad that day.]

“I do have a message for the police, but also for anyone helping the police try to find this person,” McCann said. “That is: Rest in piss.”

Insults and actions like that are what make students like Trinity feel unsafe on campus. She compared the experience to being a Jew forced to wear the star of David by the Nazis. 

“This was a traumatic experience,” Trinity said. “We’re there to spread peace and understanding and kindness, and what we got was hate crimes.”

Cal Poly Humboldt has not yet responded to a request for comment. 

Just before noon, when everything was peaceful. Photo: Dezmond Remington.