Pro-Palestinian students, left, and pro-Israel students, right, at rallies at Columbia University in New York City on Thursday, Oct. 12. Photo by Camillo Barone

By Camillo Barone October 12, 2023

Columbia University kept pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian demonstrators on opposite sides of its main campus and blocked it off to anyone without a school ID on Thursday, the day after an Israeli student was allegedly assaulted while hanging up posters of people kidnapped by Hamas.

The Israeli student, 24, was allegedly attacked with a stick outside the university’s iconic Butler Library by a female suspect, 19, the school’s student newspaper reported. The Columbia Spectator wrote that a New York Police Department spokesperson said the student suffered minor injuries and that the suspect was taken into custody and charged with one count of assault.

A friend of the Israeli student told the newspaper that the suspect had joined the Israeli student and others Wednesday morning as they were putting up posters of kidnapped Israelis, and that she said she was Jewish and stayed with the group throughout the morning. Late in the afternoon the group noticed her outside the library, a bandana covering her face, as she tore down posters of the kidnapped. She screamed obscenities at the group when they questioned her and then allegedly attacked the Israeli student with a stick and tried to punch him in the face, he told the newspaper.

The alleged victim, who is enrolled in Columbia’s School of General Studies and spoke to the Spectator anonymously, said he was afraid to be an Israeli on campus and was nervous about the rally that the school’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine was organizing for the next day.

The atmosphere at Columbia, as well as other colleges and universities, has been charged this week as Jewish and Israeli students mourn the victims of Hamas’ attack on Israel, and members of SJP blame Israel for the violence and mourn those killed in Gaza as Israel retaliates. More than 1,200 Israelis have been killed so far, according to the Israeli government, and more than 1,500 Palestinians, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.

Dueling rallies 

Both SJP’s rally and one organized by Students Supporting Israel — of about 150 students each — remained peaceful on Thursday afternoon, though Columbia administrators took pains to make sure the two groups remained on opposite sides of the quad and that no one unaffiliated with the university could attend. About 30 NYPD officers patrolled around the groups as helicopters flew overhead and pro-Palestinian students shouted “Free Palestine” and Jewish students sang “Oseh Shalom” in Hebrew, a prayer for peace.

Toward the end of the rallies, the pro-Palestinian students lay down to represent the dead in Gaza. After 90 minutes on the Upper West Side campus, the two groups departed, but 10 minutes apart, as directed by police.

Jewish and Israeli students at Columbia have complained of harassment since Hamas invaded Israel on Saturday. Messages praising the Hamas attacks popped into a General Studies students’ WhatsApp group chat, several students reported. One of those students sent screenshots of the messages to the Forward, including one which read “Say goodbye to your friend, like we had to,” and showed a photo of an Israeli hostage, and another that read “Someone kicked you out of Europe and you took as a sign to take homes of Palestinians.”

Also this week, a Stanford University instructor was suspended for telling the Jewish students in class to stand in the corner, and then declaring: “This is what Israel does to the Palestinians.” And demonstrators interrupted a vigil for victims of Hamas at Brooklyn College Tuesday, as reported on multiple Instagram posts.

Tensions are not limited to college campuses. Pro-Palestinian demonstrators in Times Square applauded rocket attacks on Israel this weekend. But those outraged by Israel have also been subjected to harassment and worse. The New York Times reported on two incidents in Brooklyn Wednesday night, one in which a man “in traditional Jewish attire” grabbed a Palestinian flag from a group of four demonstrators — two of whom were Jewish — and beat one of them with it. In the other incident, a group of men waving an Israeli flag and yelling anti-Palestinian statements punched and kicked an 18-year-old. No arrests have yet been made in either case.

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