The pro-Palestine encampment on the lawn of St John’s College was evicted last night (03/06) with the assistance of police, after the College secured an interim legal injunction.

This marks the second eviction of the encampment in two days. On Monday (02/06), Trinity College issued a High Court injunction to remove around ten individuals in tents, citing the need for students to “study and take exams without disturbance” and for staff to carry out their work. Protesters then relocated to the lawn outside John’s chapel.

John’s porters notified protesters of the eviction at around 10 PM last night, presenting the injunction document and stating it comes with “supporting evidence,” with around 10 individuals sleeping in tents overnight being told to “vacate the land”. Porters and bailiffs then dismantled the site, removing flags and tents and placed fences stretching from Trinity Street to the porter’s lodge on Bridge Street.

Police were later called to the site, telling protesters: “If you don’t leave you’ll be in breach of this injunction and I imagine, if you are in breach of this injunction, you will end up in front of the High Court judge somewhere in London… for contempt of court. Contempt of court tends to lead to people ending up in prison and other serious things.”

The activists, watching the tents being removed outside the fences, chanted “disclose, divest, we will not stop, we will not rest” and “you can’t fence off every piece of land”. One speaker said: “You know what the irony is, if they started fencing off everything they own in Cambridge then everyone would see all the land they f**king own and maybe more people would be rebelling”.

It is currently unclear whether the encampment has disbanded permanently, temporarily, or relocated. Both Trinity and John’s face upcoming High Court hearings on extending their injunctions, with Trinity’s on Thursday and John’s hearing date unknown. Both colleges have instructed the same lawyer, Kester Lees KC of Falcon Chambers, Varsity understands.

On Monday, after relocating to John’s, a C4P spokesperson claimed a freedom of information request revealed the college holds £3.2 million in arms companies, including BAE Systems and Elbit Systems, adding that protesters are “just going to continue”.

John’s has faced criticism for its investments in the past. Last year, C4P disrupted its May Ball by scaling the New Court building and dropping a banner calling on the college to “divest from genocide”.

The encampment was originally established outside Trinity on Friday (30/05) to pressure the University to disclose and divest investments in arms companies. Protesters have accused Cambridge of obstructing “meaningful progress” in an arms divestment working group and adopting “anti-protest” policies.

The University has previously obtained injunctions against student occupations at Senate House and Greenwich House, citing the need to protect graduations and the University’s day-to-day functioning. A spokesperson denied that injunctions restrict the right to protest, calling that claim “ridiculous”.

C4P shared a video of the eviction on Instagram today, captioned “admin shamefully barricades + removes camp”.

On Monday, following the Trinity eviction, a C4P spokesperson told Varsity: “The fact that they use repression is not going to keep us from doing what we can. We are not cowards like they are. We are not going to hide behind institutional safety or whatever legal excuses we can find.”

St John’s College and Cambridge for Palestine have been contacted for comment.