Columns
SCHWARZ | The Israel-Hamas War and the Effect on the American Jewish Experience
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The war in the Middle East has created a new image of Jews around the World. How has it impacted Jews in America, and at Cornell?
The Cornell Daily Sun (https://cornellsun.com/page/2/?s=israel)
The war in the Middle East has created a new image of Jews around the World. How has it impacted Jews in America, and at Cornell?
Cornell Hillel hosted a community gathering to foster unity and pride within the Jewish community following a Cornell student posting antisemitic threats.
Around the nation, students have grown divided on the Israel-Hamas conflict. Protests have erupted, individuals have grown frustrated and angry towards those that fail to see their side. But are students expressing their anger in effective ways?
Various campus demonstrations expressing viewpoints on the ongoing Israel-Palestine conflict occurred this week, including anti-Israel graffiti, a rally in support of Palestine and a Jewish community gathering.
No matter how wrong-headed our views in this conflict, they are not sufficient reason to hate one another.
There is a very small chance that you are not aware of the crisis currently unfolding in Israel. Pictures of destruction fill our screens, and headlines continue to announce death tolls and count the missing. Many members of the Cornell community attended a memorial held by Cornell Hillel on October 11, and President Pollack has sent two emails about these events.
Unfortunately, the news often has a dehumanizing effect — instead of being thought of as real people, the dead and missing are reduced to numbers, and a country becomes only its actions. Sides arise, and issues become polarized; many forget that these are real people and real lives being destroyed, not simply pawns in a political game. The lack of understanding and empathy for Israel is nothing new.
President Pollack denounced members of the Cornell community who glorified Hamas’s Oct. 7 attacks in Israel in a statement to the Cornell community on Monday, Oct. 16.
Student supporters of Israel and Palestine each fought for control of the room at the Student Assembly meeting on Thursday, Oct. 12 in the first on-campus interaction between the two groups since the outbreak of hostilities in the Middle East on Saturday, Oct. 7.
Jewish community organizations Cornell Hillel and Cornellians for Israel organized a vigil of remembrance for the Israeli victims of the Palestinian militant group Hamas’ attacks that began on Saturday, Oct. 7.
TW: Genocide, Anti-semitism, Islamaphobia, Sexual Violence
Getting on the bus for a weekend out-of-town on Thursday, I was already thinking about Israel. I’d stumbled upon a Jacobin article about Ken Loach (the socialist filmmaker who comes up a lot in English-speaking Europe) defending the director against longstanding claims of antisemitism as he releases his final film. I’d only seen one Loach film, and can’t speak too deeply about him, though his subjects and labor focus are to me unambiguously commendable. As for the anti-semitism, I remained unconvinced by the specific allegations refuted either in the Jacobin article or in my due diligence “both sides” readings of his accusers. I watched The Old Oak yesterday.