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Columbia U. student charged with hate crimes in reported attack on Israeli student
(New York Jewish Week) — A Columbia University student is facing hate crimes charges for attacking an Israeli student during a confrontation related to Hamas’ attack on Israel.
The student, Maxwell Friedman, who police said is a 19-year-old from Brooklyn, was charged with four counts for allegedly striking another student with a stick. The altercation happened after that student, who police said is 24, put up posters on campus about Israeli casualties and hostages.
Friedman was arraigned on Thursday, has pleaded not guilty on all charges and was granted supervised release ahead of the next hearing on Nov. 28. Her lawyer declined to comment to the New York Jewish Week on the case.
The incident, which took place on Wednesday night outside the main campus library, happened as student groups across the country have staged rallies and made statements backing Hamas’ deadly attack on Israel or blaming Israel for the bloodshed. As war between Hamas and Israel has continued, battles have raged online over university responses, and Jewish groups have pressed for a more forceful response to pro-Palestinian groups’ rhetoric. Some major Jewish donors have pulled funding from universities due to their perceived lackluster condemnation of the attack.
Columbia closed its campus to the public on Thursday ahead of pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian rallies.
The man who was allegedly attacked on Wednesday, whose name was not given, told the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office that he and others had printed flyers with information about the number of deaths in Israel, along with a photograph of a kidnapped Israeli family, and posted the flyers in designated news bulletin areas on campus.
The alleged victim said he saw Friedman take down and rip up several of the flyers. He said Friedman told him and others, “F— you. F— all of you prick crackers.”
She also said, “I disrespected you. What are you going to do about it?” according to a complaint filed with the district attorney’s office.
Friedman then shoved the complainant and struck him in the hands with what appeared to be a broomstick, slicing and fracturing his finger, the complaint said.
A friend of the alleged victim, who is also Israeli, told the campus newspaper, the Columbia Spectator, that the suspect approached the pro-Israel students while they were putting up the flyers and asked to join them, saying she was Jewish. She remained with the group that morning, but later in the day, the Israelis noticed her with a bandana over her face tearing down the posters.
When the pro-Israel group confronted her, she shouted at them, hit the man with the stick and attempted to punch him in the face, one of the Israeli students told the Spectator.
Friedman was charged with one count each of assault in the second degree as a hate crime; assault in the third degree as a hate crime; aggravated harassment in the second degree; and criminal possession of a weapon in the fourth degree.
“Our community woke this morning to the terrible news that an Israeli student was assaulted outside of Butler Library last night,” the school’s Hillel said in a statement after the attack. “To be clear: we condemn any violence against any student on campus, and we especially condemn the antisemitic targeting of Israelis or Jewish students at this time.”
Three deans from Columbia University said in a joint statement on Thursday, “We know that the atmosphere on campus is extremely charged and many are concerned for their personal safety.”
“Community members are observing and experiencing disturbing anti-semitic and islamophobic acts, including intimidation and outright violence — as was experienced on campus outside Butler Library late yesterday afternoon — with some students being targeted based on their religious identity or political speech,” the statement said. “It is paramount — in a moment where it is most difficult to be together across our differences — that we recommit ourselves to doing precisely that.”
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The post Columbia U. student charged with hate crimes in reported attack on Israeli student appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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UN Security Council Meets on Iran as Russia, China Push for a Ceasefire
Members of the Security Council cast a vote during a United Nations Security Council meeting on the 3rd anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine at UN headquarters in New York, US, Feb. 24, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/David Dee Delgado
The U.N. Security Council met on Sunday to discuss US strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites as Russia, China and Pakistan proposed the 15-member body adopt a resolution calling for an immediate and unconditional ceasefire in the Middle East.
It was not immediately clear when it could be put to a vote. The three countries circulated the draft text, said diplomats, and asked members to share their comments by Monday evening. A resolution needs at least nine votes in favor and no vetoes by the United States, France, Britain, Russia or China to pass.
The US is likely to oppose the draft resolution, seen by Reuters, which also condemns attacks on Iran’s nuclear sites and facilities. The text does not name the United States or Israel.
“The bombing of Iranian nuclear facilities by the United States marks a perilous turn in a region that is already reeling,” U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the Security Council on Sunday. “We now risk descending into a rathole of retaliation after retaliation.”
“We must act – immediately and decisively – to halt the fighting and return to serious, sustained negotiations on the Iran nuclear program,” Guterres said.
The world awaited Iran’s response on Sunday after President Donald Trump said the US had “obliterated” Tehran’s key nuclear sites, joining Israel in the biggest Western military action against the Islamic Republic since its 1979 revolution.
U.N. nuclear watchdog chief Rafael Grossi told the Security Council that while craters were visible at Iran’s enrichment site buried into a mountain at Fordow, “no one – including the IAEA – is in a position to assess the underground damage.”
Grossi said entrances to tunnels used for the storage of enriched material appear to have been hit at Iran’s sprawling Isfahan nuclear complex, while the fuel enrichment plant at Natanz has been struck again.
“Iran has informed the IAEA there has been no increase in off-site radiation levels at all three sites,” said Grossi, who heads the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Iran requested the U.N. Security Council meeting, calling on the 15-member body “to address this blatant and unlawful act of aggression, to condemn it in the strongest possible terms.”
Israel‘s U.N. Ambassador Danny Danon said in a statement on Sunday that the U.S. and Israel “do not deserve any condemnation, but rather an expression of appreciation and gratitude for making the world a safer place.”
Danon told reporters before the council meeting that it was still early when it came to assessing the impact of the U.S. strikes. When asked if Israel was pursuing regime change in Iran, Danon said: “That’s for the Iranian people to decide, not for us.”
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Israel Rejects Critical EU Report Ahead of Ministers’ Meeting
FILE PHOTO: Smoke rises from Gaza after an explosion, as seen from the Israeli side of the border, June 11, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen/File Photo
Israel has rejected a European Union report saying it may be breaching human rights obligations in Gaza and the West Bank as a “moral and methodological failure,” according to a document seen by Reuters on Sunday.
The note, sent to EU officials ahead of a foreign ministers’ meeting on Monday, said the report by the bloc’s diplomatic service failed to consider Israel’s challenges and was based on inaccurate information.
“The Foreign Ministry of the State of Israel rejects the document … and finds it to be a complete moral and methodological failure,” the note said, adding that it should be dismissed entirely.
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Pope Leo Urges International Diplomacy to Prevent ‘Irreparable Abyss’
FILE PHOTO: Pope Leo XIV holds a Jubilee audience on the occasion of the Jubilee of Sport, at St. Peter’s Basilica, at the Vatican June 14, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Yara Nardi/File Photo
Pope Leo on Sunday said the international community must strive to avoid war that risks opening an “irreparable abyss,” and that diplomacy should take the place of conflict.
US forces struck Iran’s three main nuclear sites overnight, joining an Israeli assault in a major new escalation of conflict in the Middle East as Tehran vowed to defend itself.
“Every member of the international community has a moral responsibility: to stop the tragedy of war before it becomes an irreparable abyss,” Pope Leo said during his weekly prayer with pilgrims.
“No armed victory can compensate for the pain of mothers, the fear of children, the stolen future. Let diplomacy silence the weapons, let nations chart their future with peace efforts, not with violence and bloody conflicts,” he added.
“In this dramatic scenario, which includes Israel and Palestine, the daily suffering of the population, especially in Gaza and other territories, risks being forgotten, where the need for adequate humanitarian support is becoming increasingly urgent,” Pope Leo said.
The post Pope Leo Urges International Diplomacy to Prevent ‘Irreparable Abyss’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.