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Ithaca College President Rejects Anti-Zionist Group’s Demands
Illustrative Pro-Hamas and anti-Israel activists march to the White House and demand a cease-fire in Gaza. Photo: Allison Bailey/NurPhoto via Reuters Connect
The president of Ithaca College, a school located in New York, has rejected the demands of an anti-Zionist group on campus that staged a “die-in” at the school’s Peggy Ryan Williams Center while events for newly admitted students took place there.
According to The Ithacan, the official campus newspaper of Ithaca College, President La Jerne Terry Cornish refused to accede to three demands made by Students for Palestine (SFP): issuing a statement acknowledging a falsely alleged genocide of Palestinians in Gaza, shuttering Ithaca Hillel’s Birthright program for Jewish students, and, in the paper’s words, an audit “that would provide access to information about if the college receives funding from any Israeli or Zionist corporations.”
Through the college’s public relations office, Cornish told the paper that she has higher priorities.
“President Cornish told them that her sphere of influence and focus remains on representing the entire Ithaca College community, and that the best use of her voice is in advocating for dialogue across differences and in encouraging further opportunities for education, both inside and outside of the classroom,” college spokesperson Dave Maley said in a statement.
“President Cornish has great concerns about the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, and she stands by her previous statements to the campus community expressing her horror at the ongoing violence in Gaza and Israel; her support for the college’s Muslim, Arab, and Palestinian students; and her condemnation of all forms of hatred and bigotry, including Islamophobia and antisemitism,” Maley continued.
One student told The Ithacan that Students for Palestine intends to take further action, such as “showing the administration how many students are disappointed and unhappy and angry with them.” He suggested that a legion of students will join them to “keep pushing that it is not okay to stay silent.”
“Sit-ins” and “die-ins,” demonstrations in which anti-Zionist students unlawfully occupy a building and lie on the floor for hours until campus officials give them what they want, have occurred at higher education institutions across the country since Hamas’ Oct. 7 massacre of civilians in southern Israel.
Last week, Vanderbilt University in Tennessee suspended over a dozen students belonging to an anti-Zionist group that occupied an administrative building and refused to leave, according to the school’s official newspaper, The Vanderbilt Hustler. During the demonstration, students performed in full view of their peers private bathroom functions, including relieving themselves in plastic bottles. The suspended students are banned from campus until further notice.
Another sit-in at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, staged by Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), has lasted nearly a week despite the college’s president, Sarah Willie-LeBreton, saying that the demonstration is against school policy and has interfered with official business, including serving students who are disabled.
“Disruption is necessary when injustice is occurring,” SJP said on Sunday in a statement attached to a petition which defends the group’s actions. “There can be no status quo during genocide, at Smith College, or anywhere. There is no disability justice, no equity and inclusion, no protection from legal discrimination, no class justice than can exist without a free Palestine.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post Ithaca College President Rejects Anti-Zionist Group’s Demands first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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After False Dawns, Gazans Hope Trump Will Force End to Two-Year-Old War
Palestinians walk past a residential building destroyed in previous Israeli strikes, after Hamas agreed to release hostages and accept some other terms in a US plan to end the war, in Nuseirat, central Gaza Strip October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Exhausted Palestinians in Gaza clung to hopes on Saturday that US President Donald Trump would keep up pressure on Israel to end a two-year-old war that has killed tens of thousands and displaced the entire population of more than two million.
Hamas’ declaration that it was ready to hand over hostages and accept some terms of Trump’s plan to end the conflict while calling for more talks on several key issues was greeted with relief in the enclave, where most homes are now in ruins.
“It’s happy news, it saves those who are still alive,” said 32-year-old Saoud Qarneyta, reacting to Hamas’ response and Trump’s intervention. “This is enough. Houses have been damaged, everything has been damaged, what is left? Nothing.”
GAZAN RESIDENT HOPES ‘WE WILL BE DONE WITH WARS’
Ismail Zayda, 40, a father of three, displaced from a suburb in northern Gaza City where Israel launched a full-scale ground operation last month, said: “We want President Trump to keep pushing for an end to the war, if this chance is lost, it means that Gaza City will be destroyed by Israel and we might not survive.
“Enough, two years of bombardment, death and starvation. Enough,” he told Reuters on a social media chat.
“God willing this will be the last war. We will hopefully be done with the wars,” said 59-year-old Ali Ahmad, speaking in one of the tented camps where most Palestinians now live.
“We urge all sides not to backtrack. Every day of delay costs lives in Gaza, it is not just time wasted, lives get wasted too,” said Tamer Al-Burai, a Gaza City businessman displaced with members of his family in central Gaza Strip.
After two previous ceasefires — one near the start of the war and another earlier this year — lasted only a few weeks, he said; “I am very optimistic this time, maybe Trump’s seeking to be remembered as a man of peace, will bring us real peace this time.”
RESIDENT WORRIES THAT NETANYAHU WILL ‘SABOTAGE’ DEAL
Some voiced hopes of returning to their homes, but the Israeli military issued a fresh warning to Gazans on Saturday to stay out of Gaza City, describing it as a “dangerous combat zone.”
Gazans have faced previous false dawns during the past two years, when Trump and others declared at several points during on-off negotiations between Hamas, Israel and Arab and US mediators that a deal was close, only for war to rage on.
“Will it happen? Can we trust Trump? Maybe we trust Trump, but will Netanyahu abide this time? He has always sabotaged everything and continued the war. I hope he ends it now,” said Aya, 31, who was displaced with her family to Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.
She added: “Maybe there is a chance the war ends at October 7, two years after it began.”
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Mass Rally in Rome on Fourth Day of Italy’s Pro-Palestinian Protests
A Pro-Palestinian demonstrator waves a Palestinian flag during a national protest for Gaza in Rome, Italy, October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Claudia Greco
Large crowds assembled in central Rome on Saturday for the fourth straight day of protests in Italy since Israel intercepted an international flotilla trying to deliver aid to Gaza, and detained its activists.
People holding banners and Palestinian flags, chanting “Free Palestine” and other slogans, filed past the Colosseum, taking part in a march that organizers hoped would attract at least 1 million people.
“I’m here with a lot of other friends because I think it is important for us all to mobilize individually,” Francesco Galtieri, a 65-year-old musician from Rome, said. “If we don’t all mobilize, then nothing will change.”
Since Israel started blocking the flotilla late on Wednesday, protests have sprung up across Europe and in other parts of the world, but in Italy they have been a daily occurrence, in multiple cities.
On Friday, unions called a general strike in support of the flotilla, with demonstrations across the country that attracted more than 2 million, according to organizers. The interior ministry estimated attendance at around 400,000.
Italy’s right-wing government has been critical of the protests, with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni suggesting that people would skip work for Gaza just as an excuse for a longer weekend break.
On Saturday, Meloni blamed protesters for insulting graffiti that appeared on a statue of the late Pope John Paul II outside Rome’s main train station, where Pro-Palestinian groups have been holding a protest picket.
“They say they are taking to the streets for peace, but then they insult the memory of a man who was a true defender and builder of peace. A shameful act committed by people blinded by ideology,” she said in a statement.
Israel launched its Gaza offensive after Hamas terrorists staged a cross border attack on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 people hostage.
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Hamas Says It Agrees to Release All Israeli Hostages Under Trump Gaza Plan
Smoke rises during an Israeli military operation in Gaza City, as seen from the central Gaza Strip, October 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Dawoud Abu Alkas
Hamas said on Friday it had agreed to release all Israeli hostages, alive or dead, under the terms of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza proposal, and signaled readiness to immediately enter mediated negotiations to discuss the details.