The events surrounding the flag exhib­ition on the Arts Quad last week brings to light the ongoing debate over provocation and proportionate response. The 1,300 black flags lining the Arts Quad commemorated the Palestinians and Israelis who died in the December violence in Gaza. The administrators and student groups that sponsored the display sought to spread awareness of the humanitarian crisis and generate discussion amongst Cornell students. Though it was not meant to be an anti-Israeli protest, the vandalization that ensued questions the objective nature of the exhibition. Moreover, it was not the protest itself, but the way in which it was implemented that seems to have provoked students to resort to vandalism.

This past Sunday evening I sat perched in Libe Café poring over Titus Andronicus and The War Between the Tates, and in the failing light I watched as half a dozen students lined the quad’s walkways with over a thousand black flags.

Witnessing these young people brave Ithaca’s brutal winter twilight warmed my heart, for in my naïveté I thought they were paying tribute to Black History Month.

Perhaps each black flag represented a fallen African American soldier in the Civil War or each African American imprisoned and murdered in the struggle for civil rights.

Unlike most Cornell students, I have witnessed the current debate on the Gaza conflict and the vandalism controversy from abroad. Based on the fragments I can understand from friends and The Sun, it looks as though we are confronting a set of issues much broader than ourselves, but in which we are nevertheless implicated. I want to provide the perspective of a student who cares deeply about our campus politics vis-à-vis the Middle East — but who is currently in the region.

On Monday morning I found myself running breathlessly up to campus, on my way to Clark Library to finish a long overdue electrodynamics problem set. When I arrived on the Arts Quad, I was greeted by 1,300 black flags and a host of signs displaying statistics from the Battle of Gaza.

Later in the day, detractors would remove the signs from the Arts Quad. They would stow away statements made by the U.N., Amnesty International and the BBC. They would stamp out the statistics — houses destroyed, children murdered and war crimes committed. But they wouldn’t uproot the flags.

There were simply too many flags. In the 15 minutes between classes, who could uproot all 1,300 of them?

Three days after signs protesting the war in Gaza were vandalized and stolen from the Arts Quad, Cornell has seen a backlash of pro-Israel sentiment on campus. Flyers stating, “Would you want Hamas in your backyard?” were attached to the black flags in the Gaza display early Tuesday morning, but were removed by 5 a.m. Tuesday.

The original signs — which included facts from Amnesty International and the United Nations about the crisis in Gaza — have been replaced with new signs with the same statements. Police still have not apprehended any individuals involved with tearing down the original signs.

This week, 1,300 black flags — each one memorializing the death of an Israeli or a Palestinian in the ongoing conflict in the Middle East — grace the Arts Quad. On Monday, the first day they were displayed, the accompanying signs were ripped up and destroyed. While this action was both illegal and morally reprehensible, the display itself did little to foster dialogue, serving instead to further polarize each side of the debate. If peace — both on campus and in the Middle East — is to be achieved, actions must go beyond battles fought on the Arts Quad.

Less than half a day after members of Cornell community peppered the Arts Quad with flags and signs protesting the war in Gaza, those same signs lay in a heap inside the Green Dragon Café. Around 2 p.m., as the 1,300 black flags — signifying each Palestinian and Israeli who died in the attacks — blew in the February breeze, the accompanying signs were destroyed, stolen and discarded.

NEW YORK (AP) — About 100 protesters shouting "This is what democracy looks like!" stormed a hotel ballroom where billionaire Mayor Michael Bloomberg was addressing an economic forum and accused him of ignoring the concerns of working-class people.

A few minutes into the mayor's speech Tuesday, the demonstrators charged in, chanting and waving signs that said, "Mayor Bloomberg, talk to us about the future of NYC!"

Protesters said the demonstration was organized by a coalition that advocates for communities. They said Bloomberg, founder of the Bloomberg LP financial information company, has favored the rights of rich developers over those of working-class people.

“Hey ho! These sexist assholes have to go!”

The chants heard on Ho Plaza last Wednesday reverberated throughout campus, within earshot of the University’s administrators tucked behind the walls of Day Hall. The student activist group, Sexual Violence Resistance Network, touted pickets and distributed pamphlets, inciting inflammatory statements such as, “one in four women at Cornell will have experienced rape and/or attempted rape.”

“Our campus is rife with rape culture,” said Marlena Fontes ’10, in front of a few dozen noisy protestors on Ho Plaza. “I tell you this not to bring you down, but to bring you out to fight.”

On Tuesday night, as many Cornellians returned to campus, a group of students joined Ithaca residents and Ithaca College students at the Ithaca City School District’s Board of Education Meeting to speak up about the issues of racism facing the town.

Around 100 people attended the meeting, held at 7 p.m. at Ithaca High School’s Kulp Auditorium, to take advantage of the opportunity to speak out during the “Receiving and Hearing of Delegations” by the public that follows the opening of the Board’s meetings.