Cornell Anti-Israel Vandalism Opens School Year

[Music] no Brian no you're not yesterday was only the first day of the semester but already anti-israeli protesters have descended onto Cornell's campus even shattering the door to Administrative Building and spray painting Israel bombs Cornell's pays and blood is on your hands on the wall Cornell University law professor uh William Jacobson is the founder of equal protection project and he joins now sir I want to get your reaction to all of this nonsense there but I just found this this statement uh from the University just stunning our aim is not to punish individuals or to suppress the views being to promote it but to protect the rights of all in our community I mean what a nonsense no one is against the First Amendment but these people are breaking the law and they're also intimidating people right well I think that's the main mistake the administration made last year and appears to be continuing to make which is there's a huge difference between free expression and intimidation and violence and they don't seem to recognize that when you use bullhorns inside the Library when you set up an encampment right in the middle of the main quad you're not doing it really to express yourself there are a million other ways to express yourself you're doing it as an act of dominance it's an act of saying that we are going to defy the administration and we're not going to live by the rules that everybody else has to live by and we want special privileges and unfortunately the Administration has been accommodating of those special privileges of the people who are engaging in the intimidation it is so well said and they later say this in another statement we are appalled by the graffiti spray painted in glass shatter overnight along the front entrance of day Hall those responsible will be subject to suspension and criminal charge okay but they never find these people they never never go after them and there's no real plan yet to stop what happened last year from happening this year right William that's right I mean last year we were you know one of the worst campuses in the country we had a student last year who's now in prison for four years for threatening to shoot up the kosher dining hall um we've had encampments we had two students testify in Congress about the endless acts of harassment and intimidation they received to Jewish students and the administration really I think has lost their way and in part of that reason is the faculty mostly backs at least the vocal faculty backs these students and eggs them on and lives out some sort of weird revolutionary fantasy through these students and that's really the problem is they they don't understand that there are other people on the campus who would like to be able to study and get an education William what you're pointing out is that the issue is more per pervasive I mean people thinking once they fire these presidents and they get rid of a few people here and there but if it's all over Academia right now right that's right I mean this is a cultural problem on the campuses it's not a you know president who's the problem it's a culture on the campus that encourages uh anti-americanism encourages anti-Semitism encourages anti-westernism they these students are chanting for decolonization they refer to the United States as Turtle Island uh they and the university encourages this and there are faculty members who egg this on and who act as advisers on this so this is a deep cultural problem that the administration refuses to address instead they treat it as a problem of a protest here and there or graffiti here and there and that's not the problem on the campus of course they back it they're the one who you know taught these students this nonsense about America and this anti-israeli rhetoric this anti-semitic R uh William thank you so much for joining the program great thank you nuts and it's about to repeat again