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Trevor Norwitz

What I saw at Columbia on October 7

Columbia University on October 7, 2024
Columbia University on October 7, 2024

On the first anniversary of the most ghastly terrorist attack in modern history, the worst pogrom committed against Jewish people since the Holocaust, I took the subway up to 116th Street. Some Columbia students and staff were hosting a memorial service and art installation, and I went to find a place of contemplation, a space where I could stand in solidarity with others who like me still palpably feel the trauma of those unspeakable – and ongoing – atrocities. (Like so many of us, I have friends whose children were murdered on that day, and know people whose loved ones were and still are kidnapped, while a close family member had a narrow escape.)

As a Columbia alumnus myself, a 20-year adjunct faculty member (in the law school), a former CU parent, and a modest but consistent donor, Columbia is a place I have always felt very comfortable and at home.

The security at the main gate was not new, but still jarring. Sadly, given the nature of the anti-Israel movement, it is now necessary for Columbia, a bastion of liberal enlightenment, to be fortified like a military facility.

The instillation set up on the west lawn included a range of artworks memorializing the barbarity of that awful day and calling for the release of the over 100 souls who have been held hostage in Gaza dungeons for over a year (and whom we can only hope are still alive). The stark contrast with the beauty and majesty of Columbia’s campus on a clear Fall day was powerful.

At some point, there was a short but dignified program in memory of the lives taken and calling for the release of the hostages. While many of us who had come to solemnize the day were still hanging out on the lawn or the plaza, a few dozen students and faculty stood on the west side of the Low Library steps with Israeli and American flags, offering remarks and comfort, reading pieces written by survivors of the Nova festival, reciting the names of those still held hostage (alive we hope), and finally singing “Hatikvah” (not very well, I’m afraid).

On the other half of the steps, separated by barricades, a few hundred masked pro-Hamas activists gathered to celebrate the October 7 massacre. That is not an unfair characterization. Their call to action was to “flood” Columbia during the memorial, a direct homage to Hamas’ “Al Aqsa Flood” campaign of mass murder, mass rape and mass kidnapping. They chanted, and carried banners bearing, Hamas slogans glorifying the “Al Aqsa Flood,” including some calling for the eradication of Israel, and to “Globalize the Intifada” (an open call for violence against Jews everywhere).  There is no way of knowing how many of them were Columbia affiliates but presumably most were. One needed to swipe a Columbia ID to enter campus (although it would have been easy for people without regard for rules to circumvent this requirement by, for example, passing ID cards through a fence).

I should note that at no time did I feel physically in danger. Although some of the placards and slogans were hateful and incited violence, the crowd was not unruly and at least as far as I could see, did not verbally threaten or physically harass any of the memorial attendees. (Some video clips I later saw showed bad behavior by this group in the 116th Street subway station, and by them or similarly attired groups in the city streets, but I never witnessed that myself on campus.)

So at least at a superficial level, the Columbia University authorities might have thought that it was a pretty good day: everyone got to “have their say” and nobody got hurt.

But while there may not have been physical violence on campus, it is not accurate to say that nobody was hurt. I expect many who came to Columbia to solemnize the atrocities of October 7, pay respects to its victims and call for the release of the hostages, were deeply affected by the “flood” celebrations. The disdain the anti-Israel crowd showed for the feelings of those experiencing pain on that grim anniversary, and their active effort to negate and undermine that pain, was intended to hurt and it did. It was confounding and excruciating to watch hundreds of people – probably most of them students, faculty and staff from our own university – singing, dancing and celebrating the mass murder, rape, kidnapping and terrorizing of thousands of innocent people, principally Jews (and calling for more violence). It was nauseating and left one with an overwhelming feeling that our society is sick, and that Columbia University – which should be a center of moral an intellectual excellence – is at the heart of the disease.

The overwhelming majority of the pro-Hamas crowd was masked, many with keffiyehs (indeed the organizers’ instructions was that they should cover their faces and avoid swiping ID cards). The debate over “mask bans” (which have been around for ages including in response to the menacing hoods of the KKK) has been reactivated and some jurisdictions have promulgated or are considering them. The argument in favor of bans is that masks are used both to intimidate, and to enable lawbreakers to evade accountability. The other side says that mask bans are in tension with the First Amendment – if hate speech is protected speech, then you should be allowed to spew it anonymously. There are good arguments on both sides of this issue, and I have not yet decided which I favor as a general matter. But I will admit that on this occasion, while I found the presence of the pro-Hamas demonstration on October 7 deeply offensive, I did not mind that they were hiding their identities. It was strangely gratifying that they looked like a bunch of lawless hooligans afraid – or ashamed – to show their faces. This compared starkly with the open pride with which the few Israeli supporters stood their ground, holding their American and Israeli flags (one even – somewhat ludicrously – blowing a shofar).

I believe there is another reason the anti-Israel contingent mask themselves, and go to great lengths to hide their identities when they pass resolutions or take other actions to demonize Israel (as the Columbia Law Student Senate did when they rejected the application for recognition of Law Students Against Antisemitism, or the Editorial Board of the Columbia Law Review did when they circumvented long-standing editorial process to sneak into that once prestigious publication an intellectually dishonest piece of delegitimizing drivel). They know they are acting badly and that it is likely they will be on the wrong side of history, and so they fear the consequences. I strongly believe that future employers not only have a right to know but may well have a duty to seek to find out if people they are considering hiring have low intelligence, bad judgement, poor morals or any combination of those. Applicants who engaged in that behavior should be asked about it. If they are proud of their actions then they can proudly defend them (or, if their only defense is that they were young and misinformed, they can say as much and most employers will likely forgive them). In any case, while hating Israel and taking active steps to demonize it may turn off some employers, there are plenty – especially in the media, the “human rights” community or the United Nations and its many affiliated organs – for whom that would be a big plus. People should want to work at organizations that share their values, just as organizations should be entitled to hire people who share theirs.

As I watched the procession encircling the Plaza, shouting their catchy genocidal slogans – “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” … “there is only one solution, intifada revolution” – I tried to understand (to the extent I could see their faces or even just their eyes) what I was seeing.  It was not pure hate, nothing as simple as that. There were no doubt some haters (probably even some professionals) and I expect that most of the crowd did not hold positive views of Jews (and that includes their Jewish fellow-travelers – throughout history Jewish antisemites have been among the most virulent). It was a mixed bag. For some this was their big protest opportunity – their Civil Rights Movement, Vietnam war or anti-apartheid moment. For some this was their Coachella, a way to hang with the cool kids. Many seemed deadpan as though they weren’t even sure why they were there but someone (a teacher, a manager, a friend) told them to come. Some, given their primary sources of information, may actually have believed that Israel is deliberately killing Palestinian civilians or that Hamas is fighting for Palestinian “liberation”. It is possible this masked crowd could have included students of mine, or colleagues, even people with whom I interact and would not think of as antisemites. But one thing they did have in common was a complete lack of empathy for the victims of October 7 and their loved ones. And if they were Columbia students, they also shared the reality that Columbia had failed them in its promise to teach them to think clearly, consider the evidence, and be intellectually honest. Indeed, Columbia has left them – and many like them – incapable of distinguishing between truth and falsehood, or even between good and evil.  Watching them did not make me angry. It made me sad.

At the time, I was not aware whether this “Flood” was authorized and being conducted in accordance with the University’s vaunted new time and place rules for protests (which were intended, at least in part, as a response to the tsunami of antisemitism on campus). I assumed that it was, as none of the security personnel were taking action against the anti-Israel crowd, or even asking the masked leaders to identify themselves (as they were entitled to do and should have done).  I now understand that this demonstration was not in fact notified or conducted in accordance with the applicable rules.  Given that, it is imperative that the planners and leaders of the “Flood” face appropriate consequences and very soon.  At a minimum, the shadowy informal and thus unaccountable umbrella “group” CUAD (an Orwellian acronym which really stands for Columbia University antisemitic degenerates) and its member organizations should be banned from campus.  Individuals who knowingly flouted the rules should also be sanctioned.  Who has the Columbia administration banned from campus after October 7?  Only an Israeli professor who got in their faces to forcefully urge them to apply their rules.  If Columbia fails to take appropriate corrective action, it will not only be failing its Jewish and other law-abiding community members, but it will also make a joke of its efforts to improve the situation including through its formation of an Antisemitism Task Force and its adoption of new time and place rules and standards for demonstrations.

Assuming the Hamas supporters had bothered to try comply with the University’s rules, would it have been appropriate for Columbia to allow their counter-demonstration on the Low Library Steps on October 7? One might argue that it would, in the name of “free speech.” In my view this is not a question of free speech, but of whether a private institution like Columbia University is willing to accord its minorities the respect and dignity of allowing them space to mourn their tragedies, without having their feelings overwhelmed by odious hate speech. Would Columbia grant “equal space” to hundreds of hooded Ku Klux Klan members carrying burning crosses and hateful placards while shouting racist chants to drown out a Juneteenth or Black Lives Matter memorial?  Perhaps, and of course the question is largely “academic” as that situation will not arise.  In the Israel-Palestine context it is also asymmetrical, as Jews (generally) do not celebrate the pain of others.  To raise a less academic hypothetical, which sadly could become reality in the near future, would Columbia allow neo-Nazis wearing swastikas and death masks to overshadow a Holocaust memorial gathering in the interests of “free speech”?  I would hope not but I am not at all confident.

There is of course currently an ongoing search for a new Columbia University President.  Columbia desperately needs new leadership, leaders who can distinguish truth from lies, and good from evil, and – critically – who also have the courage to act on that knowledge.

About the Author
Trevor Norwitz is a practicing lawyer in New York, who also teaches at Columbia Law School.
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