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Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s daughter boycotts namesake CUNY center over anti-Israel speech at law school graduation
(New York Jewish Week) – The daughter of the late New York Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan is boycotting the opening of a CUNY institution named after her father due to a speech at the university’s law school commencement that she called antisemitic.
Maura Moynihan, 66, told the New York Jewish Week that she believes the university system has not done enough to combat and condemn antisemitism on their campuses. In protest, she said that she intends to skip the Thursday opening of The Moynihan Center, a City College institution dedicated to cultivating new public affairs leaders.
“The speech by Fatima Mousa Mohammed at the CUNY Law School commencement shocked and horrified so many people in New York and around the world,” Moynihan said, referring to a May 12 graduation speech by a student who praised the law school as a rare place where students could, in her view, “speak out against Israeli settler colonialism.”
Moynihan added that her father, an Irish Catholic, was a great supporter of Israel. She said that by not condemning Mohammed’s address, The City College of New York — which is also part of the CUNY system but operates separately from the law school — is “taking his name in vain.”
The Daniel Patrick Moynihan Center is part of City College’s Colin Powell School for Civic and Global Leadership. It will host two new fellowship programs and a slate of events dedicated to advancing public scholarship and public service. The center received a grant of nearly $7 million from the Leon Levy Foundation, which is known for supporting many Jewish causes in New York City, including the Tenement Museum and the Center for Jewish History.
The younger Moynihan’s boycott comes after years of salvos against CUNY by Jewish and pro-Israel activists, both inside and beyond the university. Advocates have charged that the school has tolerated expressions of antisemitism and anti-Zionism from faculty and students, and in 2016, in light of those allegations, the university opened a probe into antisemitism at the school. The report concluded that actions by the campus chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine, while seen as offensive, were not antisemitic.
Particularly in recent years, the law school has been the focus of accusations of antisemitism. In 2022, after faculty and student associations at the school endorsed a boycott of Israel, the New York City Council held a hearing grilling CUNY officials on bigotry against Jews on campus. Mohammed’s speech renewed the antisemitism allegations.
CUNY Chancellor Felix Matos Rodríguez and the university’s board of trustees denounced her address as “hate speech” on May 30 and said it amounts to “a public expression of hate toward people and communities based on their religion, race or political affiliation.”
A spokesman for City College told the New York Jewish Week that “we, as a campus, including our Centers and Institutes, cannot comment on issues that are specific to other colleges.” The spokesman added that “City College, like all schools within the City University of New York system, has an unwavering commitment to all of our students, faculty and staff.”
Maura Moynihan believes that by not doing more, CUNY is not living up to her father’s legacy. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who studied for a year at City College before enlisting in the military, began his political career in the 1950s in the office of New York’s governor. He served as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations in 1975, where he became well-known for his staunch defense of Israel after the U.N. officially declared that “Zionism is racism.” His speech following that decision was a key moment in his political career, coming two years before he won a senate seat in 1977. Though the U.N. resolution passed, Moynihan successfully worked to get it overturned in 1991. He retired from the Senate in 2001.
Maura Moynihan said that while watching Mohammed’s commencement address, she was reminded of a line from her father’s 1975 UN speech: “A great evil has been loosed upon the world; the abomination of antisemitism has been given the appearance of international sanction.”
“That’s how I felt when I watched it, several times,” she said. “That the abomination of antisemitism has been sanctioned.”
And though her father “worked tirelessly to see it overturned, the damage had been done,” the younger Moynihan said. She believes that Mohammed’s speech, in which Mohammed encouraged “the fight against capitalism, racism, imperialism and Zionism around the world,” had the same effect. Moynihan, like her father, is not Jewish, though she once worked as a communications consultant at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C.
At issue, Moynihan added, was the setting: Mohammed’s speech occurred at an event held by a publicly-funded university. “Had she said it privately, in a different context or forum, that would be disturbing enough, but we do have free speech in this country,” she said. “But she said it at the CUNY Law School commencement, which is paid for with our tax dollars as New Yorkers and New York has one of the largest Jewish communities in the world.”
Moynihan feels that the condemnation by CUNY leadership was “simply not enough.”
“I’m so sick of people, when these antisemitic statements and incidents come up, they somebody writes a tweet or a statement condemning it, but they don’t take action,” she said, questioning why the law school’s dean, Sudha Setty, was not fired after she was seen applauding the speech. She wants the Moynihan Center to release a statement echoing the chancellor’s condemnation of Mohammed’s speech. “It is illegitimate to have a Moynihan Center that will not invoke his famous speeches at the United Nations,” she said.
Moynihan is no stranger to controversy: In March 2021, she was filmed by an Asian couple in Kips Bay, who alleged that she repeatedly yelled at them to “Go back to China.”
In a statement, Moynihan told ABC 7 New York that the incident was a “misunderstanding.” “It had nothing whatsoever to do with any bias or racism or anti-Asian American prejudice, as has been wrongly suggested,” she said, adding that the dispute was over a taxi cab.
Moynihan said that she has tried to contact City College several times to encourage them to make a statement. She said hasn’t been able to get in touch with administration, which she found “extremely disappointing.” It is unclear as to whether the late senator’s wife, Moynihan’s 93-year-old mother, Elizabeth, will attend Thursday’s ceremony.
“If you can’t stand up against antisemitism in the CUNY system, in my father’s hometown of New York, what is the point of a center that bears his name?” she said. “We cannot stay silent about this dangerous normalization of antisemitism.”
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The post Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s daughter boycotts namesake CUNY center over anti-Israel speech at law school graduation appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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US Senators Urge Secretary of Homeland Security to Secure Northern Border From Gaza Refugees
US Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) speaking at a press conference about the United States restricting weapons for Israel, at the US Capitol, Washington, DC. Photo: Michael Brochstein/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect
Six US senators sent a letter to US Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas this week requesting that he increase security measures along the northern border in response to Canada accepting an influx of refugees from Gaza, the Palestinian enclave ruled by the terrorist group Hamas.
The six Republican lawmakers — Sens. Marco Rubio (FL), Ted Cruz (TX), Joni Ernst (IA), Tom Cotton (AK), Mike Braun (IN), and Josh Hawley (MO) — said they were “deeply concerned” that refugees from Gaza could sneak into the United States. The senators warned that allowing unvetted Palestinian refugees to cross the border poses a serious national security threat.
“On May 27, 2024, the Government of Canada announced its intent to increase the number of Gazans who will be allowed into their country under temporary special measures,” the senators wrote. “We are deeply concerned and request heightened scrutiny by the US Department of Homeland Security should any of them attempt to enter the United States at ports of entry as well as between ports of entry.”
After arriving in Canada, the Palestinian refugees will be given a “Refugee Travel Document,” which serves as a valid form of identification, the letter claimed, adding that US Citizenship and Immigration Services recognizes these documents as a valid substitute for a passport. The senators warned that “individuals with ties to terrorist groups” could potentially enter into the United States.
The letter argued that the US should maintain “common-sense terrorist screening and vetting” for any individual attempting to enter its borders from a foreign country. The lawmakers lamented that the Biden administration’s “”ax border enforcement” has rendered the country vulnerable to potential terrorist attacks. From April 1, 2023 to March 31, 2024, the US Customs and Border Protection’s Office of Field Operations intercepted over 233 suspected terrorists at the northern border, according to the letter.
“[T]he possibility of terrorists crossing the US-Canada border is deeply concerning given the deep penetration of Gazan society by Hamas,” the senators wrote. “It would be irresponsible for the US to not take necessary heightened precautions when foreigners attempt to enter the United States.”
On Oct. 7, Hamas launched the ongoing war in Gaza with its Oct. 7 invasion of and massacre of 1,200 people across southern Israel. The Palestinian terrorist group also kidnapped over 250 hostages.
In response, Israel launched defensive military operations in Gaza with the aim of freeing the hostages and permanently dislodging Hamas from the neighboring enclave.
The vast majority of Palestinians in Gaza, as well as the West Bank, still support Hamas’ Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel that started the ongoing war, and they would prefer a “day after” scenario in which Hamas remains in control of Gaza rather than the Palestinian Authority, which governs in the West Bank, or other Arab countries, according to recent Palestinian polling. The same polling found that, when asked about support for Palestinian political parties and movements, a plurality chose Hamas.
US lawmakers are split along party lines as to whether the United States should accept refugees from Gaza. Republicans are largely opposed to importing refugees from Gaza, arguing that individuals from the war-torn enclave present “a national security risk” to the United States.” In May, Ernst and Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) sent US President Joe Biden a letter, urging him not to accept any refugees from Gaza.
In June, however, a group of 70 Democratic lawmakers sent Mayorkas a letter, requesting he create “pathways” for more refugees of the Israel-Hamas war to resettle in America.
The post US Senators Urge Secretary of Homeland Security to Secure Northern Border From Gaza Refugees first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Video of Masked Man Vowing ‘Rivers of Blood’ at Paris Olympics Over Israel Support Appears to Be Fake, of Russia Origin
Screenshot of a widely circulated video published on social media showing a masked man vowing that “rivers of blood will flow” at the 2024 Paris Olympics due to France’s support for Israel. According to reports, the video appears to be fake and of Russian origin.
A widely circulated video published on social media this week showing a masked man vowing that “rivers of blood will flow” at the 2024 Paris Olympics due to France’s support for Israel appears to be fake and of Russian origin, according to reports.
The video — published on Tuesday on social media networks including X/Twitter and Telegram — featured a keffiyeh-clad man with his face covered, delivering an Arabic-language address threatening France with violence due to the country’s alleged support for Israel amid its ongoing war with Hamas in Gaza.
Addressing “the people of France” and “French President [Emmanuel] Macron,” the masked individual said, “You supported the Zionist regime in its criminal war against the people of Palestine. You provided Zionists with weapons; you helped murder our brothers and sisters, our children.”
“You invited the Zionists to the Olympic games. You will pay for what you have done!” continued the man, who wore a shirt adorned with a Palestinian flag. “Rivers of blood will flow through the streets of Paris. This day is approaching, God willing. Allah is the greatest.”
The video, published on X/Twitter by the account @endzionism24 and retweeted by Palestinian activist Ihab Hassan, ended with the speaker holding a prop severed head complete with fake blood up for the camera.
He is not a Palestinian:
A video clip has surfaced showing an individual wearing a keffiyeh and a Palestinian flag badge, threatening France with a “river of blood” at the Olympic Games.
It is glaringly obvious to any Arabic speaker that this person is not Arab; his dialect… pic.twitter.com/rwWGkkbiAi
— Ihab Hassan (@IhabHassane) July 23, 2024
Hassan and other social media users immediately noted that the man speaking was clearly not a native Arabic speaker, citing his reasonably fluent but awkward and occasionally incorrect pronunciation.
Many social media users aware of the mispronunciations seemed to blame Israel for the video, implying the clip was a false flag meant to fearmonger and demonize Palestinians and Muslims. They did not address the fact that Israel has access to hundreds of thousands of native Palestinian Arabic speakers who would sound far more convincing than the man in the video.
On Wednesday, French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said that “French secret services and their partners have not been able to authenticate the veracity of this video.”
According to researchers at Microsoft, however, the video appears to be part of a Russian-linked disinformation campaign meant to disrupt the Olympics, which began with the opening ceremony on Friday.
The researchers from Microsoft’s Threat Analysis Center told NBC News that the clip appears to have come from a Russian disinformation group known as Storm-1516, an outgrowth of Russia’s Internet Research Agency.
The latest clip was linked to a similar disinformation video falsely alleging that Ukraine had sent arms to Hamas — a claim for which there is no evidence. According to the researchers, the more recent video appears to be part of a Russian scare campaign meant to disrupt the Olympics.
The video came just days before France’s rail infrastructure was hit on Friday, ahead of the start of the Olympics, with widespread acts of vandalism including arson attacks, paralyzing travel to Paris from the rest of France and Europe just hours before the opening ceremony of the Olympics. French authorities described the acts as “criminal” and “malicious.”
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said that the sabotage of France’s high-speed rail network was directed by Iran, which Western intelligence agencies have for years labeled as the world’s foremost state sponsor of terrorism.
“The sabotage of railway infrastructure across France ahead of the Olympics was planned and executed under the influence of Iran’s axis of evil and radical Islam,” Katz wrote on X/Twitter. “As I warned my French counterpart [Stéphane Séjourné] this week, based on information held by Israel, Iranians are planning terrorist attacks against the Israeli delegation and all Olympic participants. Increased preventive measures must be taken to thwart their plot. The free world must stop Iran now — before it’s too late.”
Katz was referring to a letter he sent on Thursday to Séjourné raising alarm bells about what he described as a plan by Iran to attack Israel’s Olympic delegation.
Darmanin and French National Police both announced previously that they are taking increased security measures to ensure the safety of Israel’s Olympic delegation while they are in Paris amid mounting threats. These measures include providing them with round the clock security from French police. The Israeli delegation will also receive additional security details from Israel’s Shin Bet security agency during the Olympics.
The post Video of Masked Man Vowing ‘Rivers of Blood’ at Paris Olympics Over Israel Support Appears to Be Fake, of Russia Origin first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Top St. Louis Newspaper Endorses US Rep. Cori Bush’s Opponent, Argues Incumbent’s Israel Stance Is ‘Disqualifying’
US Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) raises her fist as US Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) addresses a pro-Hamas demonstration in Washington, DC. Photo: Reuters/Allison Bailey
The editorial board of The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the largest daily newspaper in Missouri, has endorsed the opponent of US Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO), pointing to the incumbent congresswoman’s lack of legislative accomplishments and stance on the Israel-Hamas war.
The Post-Dispatch argued that Bush’s position on Israel and the Gaza war should be “disqualifying” for any elected representative. The outlet took umbrage with Bush for equating a close democratic ally of the US with a genocidal terrorist organization.
“Israel’s conduct of the war has been far from perfect, but it remains a democracy fighting for survival against an evil terrorist organization. Bush’s tendency to equate both sides — and even to side with the terrorists, as when she cast one of just two House votes against a resolution to bar Hamas members from the US — should in itself be disqualifying for re-election,” the editorial board wrote.
Bush has established herself as one of the most vocal critics of Israel in the US Congress. Only nine days after Hamas’ Oct. 7 slaughter of roughly 1,200 people in southern Israel, Bush called for an “immediate ceasefire” between Israel and the Palestinian terrorist group. As the war dragged on, Bush’s rhetoric toward Israel sharpened, with the congresswoman accusing the Jewish state of committing “genocide” in Gaza and “apartheid” in the West Bank. Bush has also accused Israel of inflicting a “famine” in Gaza without providing evidence.
Bush seems more interested in pandering to the far-left fringes of the progressive movement than serving her constituents, the Post-Dispatch argued. Bush’s membership in “The Squad” — a clique of far-left progressive, anti-establishment lawmakers in the House of Representatives — has rendered her completely incapable of “accomplishing anything” in the halls of Congress, according to the newspaper.
The editorial board urged its readers to vote for Wesley Bell, pointing to his moderated approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as an example of his pragmatism and moral clarity.
“On Israel, Bell offers an appropriately measured stance, acknowledging the need to protect Gazan civilians and work toward a two-state solution, while supporting America’s closest ally in the Middle East,” the outlet wrote.
In contrast to Bush, Bell has expressed more sympathy to Israel’s military operations in Gaza, emphatically rejecting the notion that Israel’s actions in Gaza constitute “genocide” or “ethnic cleansing.”
Moreover, Bell has strengthened his ties with the Jewish community over the course of his campaign. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the foremost pro-Israel lobbying group in the US, donated a reported $5 million to Bell’s campaign through its United Democracy Project super PAC. A group of 30 St. Louis-area rabbis penned a letter endorsing Bell, accusing Bush of a “lack of decency, disregard for history, and for intentionally fueling antisemitism and hatred.” Bell also brought about an official “director of Jewish outreach” to increase turnout among the Jewish community.
A poll commissioned by McLaughlin & Associates and sponsored by the CCA Action Fund, a pro-Bell super PAC, showed Bell with a commanding 56 percent to 33 percent lead over Bush.
Supporters of Israel see the primary race as a prime opportunity to oust another opponent of the Jewish state from the halls of Congress. Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY), a progressive lawmaker, lost his primary race to a pro-Israel challenger on June 25. Over the course of his reelection campaign, Bowman accused Israel of committing “genocide” and enacting “apartheid” against Palestinians. Bowman’s comments incensed Jewish constituents in the leafy suburbs of Westchester County, New York.
Furthermore, observers are looking to the race as a potential indicator of the Democratic electorate’s position on Israel. Opinions of the Jewish state among Democrats have soured in the months following Oct. 7, calling into question whether anti-Israel views are still a liability with American liberals.
The post Top St. Louis Newspaper Endorses US Rep. Cori Bush’s Opponent, Argues Incumbent’s Israel Stance Is ‘Disqualifying’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.