[[link removed]]

WE VISITED THE SOLIDARITY ENCAMPMENT AT COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY. HERE’S
WHAT IT’S REALLY LIKE.  
[[link removed]]


 

Tiffany Cabán, Shahana Hanif, Sandy Nurse and Alexa Avilés
April 23, 2024
City and State
[[link removed]]


*
[[link removed].]
*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

_ What we saw couldn’t be more different from the dire warnings of
rampant antisemitic threats and pervasive danger coming from City
Hall, Albany and the White House. _

City Council Members Tiffany Cabán (second from left), Alexa Avilés
(third from left), Shahana Hanif (second from right) and Sandy Nurse
(far right) visited the “Gaza Solidarity Encampment” at Columbia
University on April 20, 2024., TALIA JANE

 

If you only go by the recent statements from Mayor Eric Adams
[[link removed]], Gov.
Kathy Hochul
[[link removed]],
and President Joe Biden
[[link removed]], you might
conclude that a student protest against the mass killing in Gaza is
worse than the killing itself.

These official statements, and so many posts on social media, depict
the Gaza Solidarity Encampment on the Columbia University campus as a
cesspit of antisemitic hatred and a threat to the safety of all Jewish
students and faculty. The vilification of these students reached its
climax last week, when Columbia President Minouche Shafik assessed
that the encampment posed “a clear and present danger”
[[link removed]] to
the university and invited the NYPD’s notoriously violent
[[link removed]] Strategic
Response Group to crush the protest and arrest more than 100 students
who participated in it.

On Saturday, we visited the reconstituted encampment ourselves to add
our voices to the students’ calls for a ceasefire in Gaza and
freedom for Palestinians. What we saw couldn’t be more different
from the dire warnings of rampant antisemitic threats and pervasive
danger coming from City Hall, Albany and the White House.

The encampment is completely peaceful – an assessment shared not
only by NBC’s reporter on the scene
[[link removed]],
but even NYPD Police Chief John Chell
[[link removed]],
whom we are not accustomed to agreeing with. The demonstration is
well-organized, clean and disciplined. New entrants are immediately
asked to commit to sound community agreements
[[link removed]],
which include not engaging with provocateurs. Over 100 student groups
are coordinating 24-hour programming, inspiring interfaith spaces,
snacks and art supplies for children and musical performances. This is
the exact sort of initiative that should be welcomed, not suppressed,
by the university’s leadership.

This is particularly true in light of the saga that led to this
moment. Students have respectfully uplifted a set of demands
[[link removed]],
centering on the university’s divestment from the oppression of
Palestinians, for months. Over that time, their tactics have escalated
from distributing pamphlets to organizing rallies and walkouts and now
to this encampment, because at every point they have been met either
with silence from university administrators or with repression. Last
November, the administration suspended
[[link removed]] campus
chapters of Jewish Voice for Peace and Students for Justice in
Palestine. The student protesters even endured an attack with a
chemical agent
[[link removed]] –
about which the mayor, governor, and president were largely silent.

Far from a danger zone where Jews should fear to tread, the encampment
hosted a large kabbalat shabbat
[[link removed]] service
on Friday evening, followed the next night by an equally
well-attended havdalah
[[link removed]] service.
These, along with the many
[[link removed]] statements
[[link removed]] from
[[link removed]] Jewish
[[link removed]] students
[[link removed]] and
[[link removed]] faculty
[[link removed]] testifying
to feeling safe on campus and condemning Shafik’s crackdown on the
protests, should call into question the glib narrative peddled by
those in power that the protesters are antisemites and Columbia and
Barnard are hostile to their Jewish populations.

Make no mistake: antisemitism is real and poses a danger to our
beloved Jewish neighbors and friends. Physical violence, swastika
graffiti, antisemitic conspiracy theory, Holocaust denial and more
constitute serious threats to a community who has faced brutality and
terror for centuries and centuries, all over the world. What’s more,
antisemitism threatens other marginalized communities as well.
Antisemitic conspiracy theories bind together all types of racist,
sexist, queerphobic paranoia and hate. Those who peddle the myth that
Jews control the world are not only liable to attack Jews, but also
immigrants, Muslims, queer people and other members of scapegoated
out-groups as well. We say loudly and clearly: none of us can be safe
if any of us is in danger.

It is also true that, in recent days, some fringe agitators have made
unequivocally antisemitic and hateful statements outside the
encampment itself. We condemn these abhorrent actions wholeheartedly.
There is no place for bigotry and violence in the movement for peace.
It would be a grave error, however, to treat these actions as
reflective of the larger protests, as Columbia student organizations
have explicitly denounced
[[link removed]] them.

It does not combat antisemitism, nor keep students safe, to effect
mass arrests of peaceful protesters, suddenly evict
[[link removed]] students
from campus housing, unaccountably suspend
[[link removed]] leaders
of the student movement for Palestinian rights or impose regimes of
censorship. To the contrary, actions such as these stoke tensions,
drive divisions and endanger everyone pursuing higher education. For a
campus to be truly safe for all its students, it must welcome protest
and foster free inquiry and democratic discourse. As Shafik
herself said last fall,
[[link removed]] “The
point of university is to be intellectually challenged and confronted
with difference.”

Now, at the outset of Passover, we are moved by the Jewish freedom
celebration’s commitment to welcoming the stranger, feeding all who
seek food, humanizing the oppressed, resisting racism and hatred,
standing in solidarity with those who seek redemption from bondage and
asking questions – even, maybe especially, very hard ones. We pray
that these values will prevail, not just at Columbia and Barnard, but
around the entire world, and particularly in the Holy Land. 

We believe in freedom, safety and equal rights for all Palestinians
and Israelis, and we celebrate the students fighting for those aims,
undaunted in the face of hostile university administrators and armed
police battalions.

_Tiffany Cabán is a City Council member representing Astoria. Shahana
Hanif is a City Council member representing Park Slope, co-chair of
the Council Task Force to Combat Hate and co-chair of the Council
Progressive Caucus. Sandy Nurse is a City Council member representing
Bushwick and a co-chair of the Council Progressive Caucus. Alexa
Avilés, a 1995 graduate of Columbia College, is a City Council member
representing Sunset Park._

* Columbia University
[[link removed]]
* Student protests
[[link removed]]
* Israel-Gaza War
[[link removed]]
* Ceasefire
[[link removed]]
* Divestment
[[link removed]]

*
[[link removed].]
*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

 

 

 

INTERPRET THE WORLD AND CHANGE IT

 

 

Submit via web
[[link removed]]

Submit via email
Frequently asked questions
[[link removed]]
Manage subscription
[[link removed]]
Visit xxxxxx.org
[[link removed]]

Twitter [[link removed]]

Facebook [[link removed]]

 




[link removed]

To unsubscribe, click the following link:
[link removed]