Pro-Hamas Activists Roil Columbia University, Recruit Members for ‘Armed Struggle’

Columbia University’s most strident pro-Hamas organization distributed literature calling on students to join the terror group’s movement to destroy Israel during this year’s convocation ceremony last week, according to various reports on social media.

“This booklet is part of a coordinated and intentional effort to uphold the principles of the thawabit and the Palestinian resistance movement overall by transmitting the words of the resistance directly,” says a pamphlet distributed by Columbia University Apartheid Divest (CUAD), a Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) spinoff, to incoming freshmen. “This material aims to build popular support for the Palestinian war of national liberation, a war which is waged through armed struggle.”

Other sections of the pamphlet are explicitly Islamist, invoking the name of “Allah, the most gracious” and referring to Hamas as the “Islamic Resistance Movement.” Proclaiming, “Glory to Gaza that gave hope to the oppressed, that humiliated the ‘invincible’ Zionist army,” it says its purpose is to build an army of Muslims worldwide.

“We call upon the masses of our Arab and Islamic nations, its scholars, men, institutions, and active forces to come out in roaring crowds tomorrow,” it adds, referring to an event which took place in December. “We also renew our invitation to the free people and those with living consciences around the world to continue and escalate their global public movement, rejecting the occupation’s crimes, in solidarity with our people and their just cause and legitimate struggle.”

This latest exaltation of violence was followed by a disturbing act of vandalism on Columbia’s New York City campus. On Tuesday, a masked man poured red paint on the Alma Mater sculpture located in front of the Low Memorial Library, symbolizing the spilling of blood. A protest broke out elsewhere on campus, with a young woman, whose face was concealed with a keffiyeh, waving a sign cut into the shape of an inverted red triangle. It said, “Long live the intifada.”

First day of classes @Columbia. Welcome back. pic.twitter.com/1G3vv1eoQg

— Columbia Jewish & Israeli Students (@CUJewsIsraelis) September 3, 2024

The inverted red triangle has become a common symbol at pro-Hamas rallies. The Palestinian terrorist group, which rules Gaza, has used inverted red triangles in its propaganda videos to indicate Israeli targets about to be attacked. According to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), “the red triangle is now used to represent Hamas itself and glorify its use of violence.”

As seen in footage shared on social media, the protesters amassed in front of the Morningside Heights entrance to campus, chanting “there is only one solution intifada revolution” and imploring their classmates to skip school. The demonstration appears to have been part of a larger event staged by pro-Hamas activists in the city, and two students were reportedly arrested for being disorderly during it. They were part of a crowd that attempted to overrun barricades that law enforcement erected to contain them.

Columbia University has not responded to The Algemeiner’s request for comment about these incidents.

Asaf Romirowsky, an expert on the Middle East and executive director of Scholars for Peace in the Middle East, told The Algemeiner on Tuesday that it’s up to lawmakers to effect change at Columbia University and academia across the country.

“You would expect Columbia’s administration to learn from past mistakes and keep the situation from getting out of hand,” he said in a statement. “You would expect them to heed [New York City] Mayor Eric Adam’s wise advice and practice a zero-tolerance policy to those keen on disrupting university life and claiming university spaces as their own. But this is academia we’re talking about. They never learn, and certainly they haven’t learned when it comes to keeping Jews safe.”

He added, “Further, news, warnings from Director of Intelligence Avril Haines have now indicated direct if unspecified support for campus protesters. [Iranian Supreme Leader] Ayatollah [Ali] Khameini has praised the pro-Hamas protesters as a key part of the anti-Israel ‘resistance.’ Here too, it is unclear if the US government has taken any action. Only continued pressure will force academia to reform, which must include a rediscovery of the American values that have been dormant in the heart of the enterprise.”

This is not the first time that anti-Zionists at Columbia have endorsed Hamas, a terrorist organization which has murdered thousands of Israeli civilians and perpetrated rampant sex crimes against women and men. In May, Columbia’s SJP chapter described the group as “the only force materially fighting back against isr*el [sic].”

Wesleyan University’s SJP chapter also endorsed Hamas and its Oct. 7 massacre as its first act of the new academic year.

“On that day, fighters broke through the occupation walls, initiating a new chapter in the struggle against the US-Israeli war machine, and demanding the release of thousands of Palestinians unfairly imprisoned across their historic homeland,” the group said in a manifesto outlining its views.

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.

The post Pro-Hamas Activists Roil Columbia University, Recruit Members for ‘Armed Struggle’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.