A group of pro-Zionist students are planning to hold a rally on Thursday protesting Columbia University’s handling of complaints of anti-Zionist harassment.
The event page on Facebook states that Students Supporting Israel (SSI) sent “a detailed, thorough, and evidence-based complaint documenting our members’ harassment by anti-Zionist groups and individuals on campus, and of their clearly numbered violations of the CU Rules of Conduct.”
The complaint, which The Lawfare Project helped write, stated that groups like Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) were involved in tearing down SSI flyers and disrupting SSI events, such as a lecture by Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Danny Danon in February 2017.
Additionally, the complaint stated that in fall 2017, there was an incident in which “SJP members started a hostile, anti-Israel and anti-Semitic chant simply because they recognized SSI members walking by.”
“Video of this event shows a small handful of horrified and terrified Jewish students standing huddled together while surrounded by a raging mob of around 50 angry activists encroaching on them in a physically threatening and intimidating way,” the complaint states.
However, according to the Facebook event page, Columbia University dismissed the complaint.
SSI also filed three other complaints, including one about the daughter of the Israeli Consul General in New York being harassed by SJP members for her Israeli background. But the university has done nothing about these complaints, according to the Facebook page.
“SSI has spoken with university administrators on numerous occasions, but all our requests have fallen on deaf ears,” the event page states. “It is time to show the university that we will not stand by quietly while we and other pro-Israel students are harassed and systematically silenced on our own campus.”
The event will take place from 4-6 p.m. EST (1-3 p.m. PST) close to the main gates of the university.
