UT Austin officials claim outside forces ‘orchestrated’ violent pro-Palestinian campus protest

AUSTIN, Texas — Campus officials at the University of Texas have accused individuals from outside the school, not students, of organizing and carrying out a pro- Palestinian protest that turned violent on Monday.

Seventy-nine people were arrested at UT Monday afternoon for refusing to abandon and tear down an encampment in a park at the center of academic buildings midday Monday.

Of the 79 arrested, a UT Austin spokesperson told the Washington Examiner that 45 were not affiliated with the school, meaning they were not students, faculty, or staff.

“These numbers validate our concern that much of the disruption on campus over the past week has been orchestrated by people from outside the University, including groups with ties to escalating protests at other universities around the country,” the university said in a statement. "This is calculated, intentional and, we believe, orchestrated, and led by those outside our university community."

Campus officials said they were also troubled by the weapons, including “ guns , buckets of large rocks, bricks, steel enforced wood planks, mallets, and chains” found on protesters.

University staff have also been “physically assaulted and threatened” by protesters, according to the university.

“Police have been headbutted and hit with horse excrement, while their police cars have had tires slashed with knives,” the statement continued.

State police officers arrested dozens Monday in a fiery showdown that turned violent on the final day of classes for the spring semester.

By midday, several hundred people were seated on the lawn of the academic pavilion, refusing to leave after campus officials and law enforcement asked them to do so.

Police physically carried out protesters after they were handcuffed, even dragging some in custody who refused to walk away from the scene. University officials said in a statement that demonstrators had ignored “repeated directives from both the administration and law enforcement officers” to dismantle their tents.

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Ahead of the incident, the university received "extensive online threats from a group organizing today’s protest," UT Austin said in the statement .

The demonstration is one of dozens at colleges and universities nationwide in which students are protesting university connections to corporations that have contracts with the Defense Department or support Israel in its war against Hamas in Gaza.