On April 25, 2024, during Israel’s war against Hamas terrorists, Cornell students set up a “Gaza Solidarity Encampment” on the lawn of the university’s Art Quad. The encampment was organized by the group Coalition for Mutual Liberation (CML), which the Cornell Daily Sun described as “a pro-Palestine coalition of over 40 organizations.”
Encampment participants demanded [slide 4] that Cornell divest from companies and institutions linked with Israel and called [slide 5] for an “unconditional, permanent ceasefire in Gaza.”
Protesters also demanded [slide 6] the establishment of a Palestinian studies program with representatives from the Cornell chapter of the anti-Israel campus group Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) serving on the “committees that oversee the hiring of the program’s faculty.” They also demanded [slide 7] public acknowledgment and protection of “anti-Zionist speech, viewpoints, and histories in both religious and academic contexts.”
Zionism is the belief that Jews have the right to self-determination in their own national home, and the right to develop their national culture. Zionism is a core part of the identity of most Jews.
On April 25, 2024, a Cornell administrator met [00:00:15] with students and told them they didn’t have permission to set the encampment where it was. The Ithaca Voice reported that Cornell set up a deadline for protesters to dismantle the encampment by night facing the risk of arrest. Students reacted [00:00:36] by forming a human chain surrounding the encampment.
During the encampment, anti-Israel protesters chanted [00:00:01]: “Disclose! Divest! We will not stop! We will not rest!” Among the speakers [photo 4] at the encampment was anti-Israel professor Russell Rickford, who called the Hamas’ October 7, 2023 terror attack against Israel “exhilarating…energizing!”
One large sign that was part of the encampment’s boundary also accused [photo 2] Israel of committing “genocide” in its war against Hamas. The Cornell Daily Sun reported that protesters “continuously chanted, ‘Israel bombs, Cornell pays, how many kids did you kill today?’”
The Cornell Daily Sun reported that some students had their classes canceled “in face [sic] of the student protests, with some professors joining the encampment.”
On May 13, 2024, the Cornell encampment ended on the students’ initiative.
The Cornell encampment was one of many such encampments set up to protest Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza.
The encampment was one of over 140 pro-Hamas and anti-Israel college encampments set up in North America, and over 20 more globally, in the spring of 2024. The first began on April 17, 2024, at Columbia University. The encampments were unofficially known as the “student intifada,” borrowing a term associated with terrorist violence.
Protesters harassed Jewish students, blocked Jews from campus facilities and shouted anti-Semitic slogans. They occupied campus grounds, in many cases illegally, caused property damage, violently took over buildings, celebrated terrorism and promoted the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement.
Activists set up encampments to oppose Israel’s right to wage war against the Hamas terror group following October 7, 2023, when Hamas murdered approximately 1,200 people, including 32 American and 8 Canadian citizens. Hamas also kidnapped 252 people, including 11 Americans and the bodies of 2 murdered Canadians. As of May 26, 2024, 125 hostages remained in Hamas captivity.
For more information on the October 7, 2023 terror attacks, see the Canary Mission page on Hamas.
