Fourteen arrested at Travis Air Force Base during Gaza war protest

Amy Larson
·2 min read
114

(KRON) — Fourteen protestors were arrested at Travis Air Force Base in Fairfield after a large crowd blocked the base’s entrances Thursday morning.

Police said about 150 protestors arrived at the military base’s gates. Videos posted on social media showed crowds waiving Palestinian flags and holding up banners reading, “No U.S. weapons for genocide.”

The activist group CODEPINK Women For Peace wrote, “Today we joined several other groups in the SF Bay Area in shutting down the largest transport Air Force base in the country. We will not let arms get shipped out of our backyards to support the genocide in Gaza.”

Members of the Solano County Sheriff’s Office, Suisun Police Department, and Vacaville Police Department were called in as backup.

“Members of the Police Department and representatives from Travis Air Force Base met with protest organizers to facilitate the exercise of their constitutional rights, while also ensuring the men and women serving our nation could get onto the base. Unfortunately, almost immediately after that meeting, some of the protestors moved into the street and blocked both the North and South gates,” the Fairfield Police Department wrote.

Gaza peace activists chain themselves to ladder on ship at Oakland port

Police ordered the groups to leave the roadway but they “refused,” FPD wrote.

Ten protesters were arrested at the north gate and four more were arrested at the south gate. The 14 arrestees were later booked at Solano County Jail for refusing to disperse, according to police.

There was no force used and no reported injuries as a result of this incident, police said. Access to the base was restored by late Thursday morning.

Israel declared war after Hamas militants stormed across the Gaza border on Oct. 7, killing some 1,200 people and taking an estimated 240 hostages.

Israel’s aerial and ground offensive has been one of the most devastating military campaigns in recent history, displacing nearly 85% of Gaza’s 2.3 million people and leveling swaths of the tiny coastal enclave. Israel’s war to destroy Hamas has killed more than 20,000 Palestinians, health officials in Gaza said. Israel has vowed to keep up the fight until Hamas is destroyed and removed from power in Gaza and all the hostages are freed.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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