Cornell’s Toxic Anti-Israel Activism: “there is a possibility of someone snapping”

Cornell’s Toxic Anti-Israel Activism: “there is a possibility of someone snapping”

I previously appeard on Fox and Friends to talk about how Cornell started the school year with vandalism by anti-Israel activists, Cornell Faculty Living Out “some sort of weird revolutionary fantasy through these students”:

On August 27, 2024, I appeared on Fox News Radio Rundown to talk about a simlar topic, but for a much more extended time period and in more depth. In both appearances, I talked about the role of the faculty in using the students to act out their own revolutionary fantasies.

Here is the Fox News Radio write up.

As colleges and universities across the country welcome back students to campus they are also seeing a return of anti-Israel protests. Cornell University students in New York were met with pro-Palestinian vandalism on the first day of classes. Spray painted in red on the main administrative building of the the school were the words “Israel bombs, Cornell pays” and “Blood is on your hands.” The activists behind the vandalism told the school paper that they are targeting school property because that is the only thing the school cares about.

FOX’s Gurnal Scott speaks with William A. Jacobson, Cornell University Law Professor and Founder of EqualProtect.org, who says he is not surprised the protests have returned on day one but says there is plenty of things the school can do to respect the protestors while making the campus safe for all students.

This is a video I referenced in my discussion about a faculty member.

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I am disgusted by a @Cornell Professor’s justification of antisemitic behavior by saying she doesn’t need to abide by any code of conduct. Tenure doesn’t make anyone invincible, and it definitely should not protect hate speech. pic.twitter.com/kPrzbIU4C8

— Sam Aberman (@samaberman) April 26, 2024

And here is some of the robotic chanting and calls for violence I talk about:

Here’s the audio (my discussion starts at about 3:00)

(If player doesn’t load, click here)

Some very limited excerpts (transcript auto-generated, may contain transcription errors, lightly edited for transcript clarity):

WAJ (06:19):

Well, you’ve been seeing the frustration growing from the students on campus, not just here but elsewhere, that they have pulled out all the stops and have not really gotten their way almost anywhere. They’ve gotten some concessions here and there, but they haven’t freed Palestine yet. They haven’t destroyed Israel yet, and the antics that they’re doing is not gonna accomplish any of those things. So you see their frustration growing. And one of the people who carried out the vandalism at Day Hall was interviewed by the Cornell Sun student newspaper on condition of anonymity, but I assume they actually spoke to somebody and that person said, look, nobody’s paying attention to us. I’m paraphrasing. No one’s paying attention to us. This is something we did to get attention.

So what are they gonna do next? So I’ve been warning for a while that this was a crescendo of vitriol, a crescendo of intimidation, and there is a significant likelihood of violence.

I’m not saying it’s going to happen, but the frustration you’re seeing,  it’s almost cult-like chanting. If you look at videos of people at Cornell chanting last year, it’s very cult-like, and it’s beyond reason. You can’t reason with them. So I think that there is a possibility of someone snapping and somebody already did and broke the glass at the administrative building and, uh, sprayed graffiti. It’s not the first time there’s been graffiti on campus, but it was targeted at the center of the administration. So yeah, I think people need to be worried and people need to be concerned,

Gurnell (08:03):

And it’s a long time faculty member at Cornell University. It’s a, a brilliant school, a great school. Um, this has to strike some personal cord with you to see this happening at a place you have devoted, uh, uh, much of your career to talk, talk to me about sort of the feeling you have inside when you see something like this happen.

WAJ (08:26):

Well, I’ve been here about 18 years. If my math is correct, it’s often not correct, but approximately 17, 18 years, and I have noticed a deterioration of the campus over time when it relates to the Israel issue, that this is not the first time there’s been disruptive and aggressive anti-Israel activity on campus, never with the intensity that it has been since October 7th, but it’s been here for a long time. A lot of it is driven by the faculty. The problem of the faculty is not something the administration wants to address. In fact, they expressly refuse to address it, that these student protests are advised by faculty members. These student protests draw their inspiration from faculty members. Faculty members attend many of these events and demonstrations. There was a video circulating last year of a Cornell professor at the encampment bragging how there’s nothing anybody could do to her because she’s got tenure, which is not technically true, but she seemed to believe it was. [see video above]

So a lot of this is faculty driven. The faculty in my 17, 18 years here, I think has become more radicalized. That doesn’t mean the entirety of the faculty, but there is a core group of faculty who get some sort of cheap thrill from seeing the students, you know, commit, uh, bad behavior, and they get some sort of vicarious, um, revolutionary satisfaction from urging the students on. And it’s, it’s not really private. It’s, it’s pretty obvious that it’s going on. And so I think that the deterioration and radicalization of the faculty has gone hand in hand with the deterioration of the atmosphere on campus, and it’s something the administration doesn’t wanna address. So it is very troubling.

***

WAJ (10:57):

… pro-Israel students are not camping out in the quad, pro-Israel students are not marching through the library with electronic bullhorns to intimidate people. Pro pro-Israel students are not breaking the glass at the administration building. This is all coming from one side. So what I think needs to be done is, is a firm but fair and equal hand that these students do not have special rights that other people do not have, and that they have to live by the same set of rules that everybody else has to live by.

***

Gurnell (15:05):

Couple of other quick things, professor for you. The first thing is, in your eyes, is there any way to have a civil conversation about this on campuses, given the point that to have a civil conversation, you have to have willing participants? Do you, is there a way to do that?

WAJ (15:25):

I think it’s very difficult because the issues become so polarized and certainly you can’t have a civil conversation with the students who are engaging in these protests because they act like they’ve been completely brainwashed. They see no other side, they see no reason to deliberate on things. They just scream slogans and chant robotically. So I don’t think there really is the possibility, but I think for the vast majority of people on campus, yes, it is possible to have that conversation. The problem is, and I’ve seen this in the past, that there has been disruption of pro-Israel speakers. There have been disruption of Israel related events on campus. And the opposite is never true. The, there has not been a single pro-Palestinian event that I’m aware of that has ever been disrupted. So I think that yes, it is possible to have a reason dialogue, assuming you have reasonable people on the other side, and for at least the core group of activists, both student and faculty, I think it’s very difficult to have a conversation with them.

Gurnell (16:38):

Last thing I have, and I want to take this to Washington and globally because the administration is working with Egypt and Qatar to try to get a ceasefire, uh, in, uh, this situation. If that happens, if that agreement comes to pass, does this all go away?

WAJ (16:58):

On the campuses? I don’t think so. I think that they will continue their divestment push, they will continue the false accusations of genocide. So I don’t think it’s going make it slightest bit of difference on the campuses. Perhaps it would’ve made a difference if something had been resolved and the hostages were released all alive 10 months ago, nine months ago. But I don’t see it making a difference on the campuses now. Things are too far down the road for the situation to resolve itself just because there’s a ceasefire.

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