The Cornell Daily Sun (https://cornellsun.com/tag/israel-hamas-2/)
There are multiple ways to understand how the war in the Middle East is affecting life around us. One way, perhaps, may be to see it as an assault on the teaching profession and discourse around nation.
I’ve been at Cornell for 56 years. To say anti-Semitism has existed here is a difficult thing for me to speak about — especially regarding the place I call home.
Muslim students across Cornell condemned the recent threats made against Jewish students and called for the University to address Islamophobia with the same level of seriousness.
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.
The faculty of the Cornell Coalition for Justice in Palestine stand for Palestinian human rights, sovereignty, liberation and the right to resist.
As a professor at Cornell and living in Israel with my wife and kids, I keep asking: If a couple of hundred armed men decide at dawn to go on a rampage of bloodshed, they would likely succeed, so why dont they?
Dueling sentiments towards Prof. Russell Rickford currently divide campus following his Oct. 15 remarks, in which he stated he was “exhilarated” by Hamas’s Oct. 7 attacks against Israel.
There are many areas of social, economic and political controversies that faculty may address in exercising their academic freedom, but perhaps none so controversial as those dealing with Israel and Palestine. The University administration should stand up for faculty who exercise their academic freedom, even in the face of pressure from legislators, trustees, donors, students or alumni to sanction faculty for their speech.