Yossi Schwartz, ISL – RCIT section in Israel/Occupied Palestine, 25.04.2024
While the Biden administration and the House of Representatives, in support of the ruling capitalist class, support the Zionist genocide, more than 34,000 Palestinians in Gaza – most of them children and women – have been murdered by Israel in the war on the Gazans, health ministry says. In Nasser Hospital, close to 300 bodies in the mass grave of those murdered by the Zionist army have been found. The students in the universities rebelled; which brings to mind the rebellion during the American imperialists against Vietnam and 1968 in France
“Protests against the war in Gaza have spread from Columbia and Yale to other universities as officials smash a burgeoning protest movement. On Monday night, police moved to break up a protest at New York University and made several arrests. Dozens of students were arrested at Yale earlier in the day, while Columbia canceled in-person classes. Similar “encampments” have sprung up at Berkeley, MIT, and other colleges nationwide.”[i]
“Students at Columbia University have undertaken a Gaza Solidarity Encampment, confronting harsh repression from the university administration and the New York Police Department. They have pledged to remain in place until the university responds to their demands for divestment. The students launched the encampment on April 17, the day when Columbia president Minouche Shafik was summoned before Congress to answer a series of right-wing, Zionist attacks on students and faculty, particularly Professor Joseph Massad. Joseph Massad has faced reactionary reprisals for his scholarship on Palestine and US imperialism for decades. In the early 2000s, he was targeted by Zionist propagandists, such as Daniel Pipes and Martin Kramer, and the disgraced former US Representative Anthony Weiner. Zionist lobby groups also sought to block his tenure at Columbia in 2009. The attacks against Professor Massad have continued ever since.” [ii]
“The inquiry probed President Shafik into Professor Massad’s activities, writings, and statements. Rather than defending Professor Massad, Professor Mohammed Abdou, and her students, she joined the attack. Her answers reinforced the intellectual McCarthyism permeating Columbia’s campus and across the United States.[iii]
Every honest human being who opposes genocide must be on the side of these students or at least support them.
New York Republican Reps. Mike Lawler, Anthony D’Esposito, and Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman joined actor Michael Rappaport and radio show host Sid Rosenberg for a news conference outside of Columbia University on Monday afternoon to condemn the protests against the genocide of the Palestinians on campus. Lawler said every college and university president who refuses to take action against the students should immediately “resign in disgrace” or be thrown out.
Following the news conference in a post on X, Lawler said the House must pass the Anti Semitism Awareness Act and the Stop Anti Semitism on College Campuses Act immediately to “strip universities and colleges of funding if they allow this hatred on campus.”
“Here’s the reality: hate is taught. It is taught in the schools of Gaza, and unfortunately, it is being taught here in the United States,” Lawler said. “Enough is enough. We have a responsibility to act and ensure our students are safe from the Hamas apologists in our own country.”
This right-winger is lying when he says that the protest against the genocide of the Palestinians is Anti-Semitic. The fact is that Jews are part of the organizers of the rally. They are organized by the JVP. In the real world, Lawler is Islamophobic and supports war crimes.
Another right winger, D’Esposito, said what’s being seen is not just an attack on Jews or an attack on Israel; it’s an attack on democracy. What an ugly joke! The attack on the pro-Palestinian students is an attack on the right to free speech and form or join a rally.
At the same time, another lie of the Zionists has been exposed. After an independent review, the UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) found that Israel had provided “no evidence” of its claims of wrongdoing against the agency, which is the largest provider of services in Gaza. UNRWA says it “welcomes the findings” of the report, which confirmed it had mechanisms to ensure “compliance with the principle of neutrality”. The reason the Zionist monster wants to destroy UNRWA is to finish the recognition of its ethnic cleansing in 1948.
The mass rebellion of the students is taking place at a time when the entire Zionist state is in shock after its military Intelligence head, Maj. Gen. Aharon Haliva resigned and took responsibility for Israel’s failure on October 7. This resignation will force other military high officers to resign and pressure Netanyahu to resign. Netanyahu will try to stay in power by the incursion of the Zionist army to Raffa.
For humanity to live, imperialism must die!
For Palestine red and free from the river to the sea!
Endnotes:
[i] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-68873825
[ii] Badil 22.4.24
[iii] Ibid