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More Than 100 Killed in ‘Terrorist Attacks’ Near Iranian Guards Commander Soleimani’s Tomb During Ceremony

A banner of senior Iranian military commander General Qassem Soleimani is seen during a ceremony to mark the second anniversary of his killing in a US attack, in Tehran, Iran, Jan. 3, 2022. Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS

Two explosions caused by “terrorist attacks” killed more than 100 people and wounded scores at a ceremony in Iran to commemorate top commander Qassem Soleimani who was killed by a US drone in 2020, Iranian officials said on Wednesday.

Iranian state television reported a first and then a second blast during an anniversary event at the cemetery where Soleimani is buried in the southeastern city of Kerman.

An unnamed official told the state news agency IRNA that “two explosive devices planted along the road leading to Kerman’s Martyrs’ Cemetery were detonated remotely by terrorists.”

Babak Yektaparast, a spokesperson for Iran’s emergency services, was reported as saying 73 people had been killed and 170 injured. State television said later that at least 100 people had been killed.

No group has yet claimed responsibility for the attacks.

Videos aired by Iranian media showed dozens of bodies strewn around with some bystanders trying to attend to survivors and others hurrying to leave the blast area.

“A terrible sound was heard there, despite all the security and safety measures. We are still investigating,” Reza Fallah, head of the Kerman Red Crescent Society, told state television.

Red Crescent rescuers tended to wounded people at the ceremony, where hundreds of Iranians had gathered to mark the anniversary of Soleimani’s death. Some Iranian news agencies said the number of wounded people was much higher.

“We are now evacuating the wounded and injured in the area. The crowd is huge and the job is quite hard all the paths to there are blocked,” Fallah said.

The US killed Soleimani in a drone attack at Baghdad airport in 2020. Tehran retaliated by attacking two Iraq military bases that house US troops.

As chief commander of the elite Quds force — the overseas arm of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), a US-designated terrorist organization — Soleimani ran clandestine operations in foreign countries and was a key figure in Iran’s long-standing campaign to drive US forces out of the Middle East. He was responsible for Iran’s proxies and terror operations abroad.

Tensions between Iran and Israel, along with its ally the United States, have reached a new high over Israel‘s war on Iranian-backed Hamas terrorists in Gaza in response to Hamas’ Oct. 7 rampage through southern Israel.

Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi militia has attacked ships it says have links to Israel in the entrance to the Red Sea, one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes.

US forces have come under attack by Iran-backed militants in Iraq and Syria over Washington’s backing of Israel and have carried out their own retaliatory air strikes.

On Monday an Israeli airstrike killed a senior leader of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards in Syria.

Iran has in the past blamed Israel for attacks on individual people or places within its borders — claims which Israel has neither confirmed nor denied — but there was no indication of any foreign involvement in the explosions at Wednesday’s ceremony.

The post More Than 100 Killed in ‘Terrorist Attacks’ Near Iranian Guards Commander Soleimani’s Tomb During Ceremony first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Kanye West Releases ‘Heil Hitler’ Song, Music Video Featuring Audio of Nazi Leader’s Speech

Kanye West walking on the red carpet during the 67th Grammy Awards held at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, CA on February 2, 2025. Photo: Elyse Jankowski/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect

Antisemitic rapper Ye (formerly Kanye West) released on Thursday his new single titled “Heil Hitler” as well as its music video, but claimed that the controversial song has been “banned by all digital streaming platforms,” including iTunes and Spotify.

The Grammy winner and self-described Nazi, 47, uploaded his new track to SoundCloud on Thursday, but it has since been removed from that platform as well. The music video for “Heil Hitler” does not appear on Ye’s YouTube channel but has been shared on YouTube by other users. “Heil Hitler” is the greeting praising Nazi leader Adolf Hitler that is given as part of the Nazi salute.

On the track, Ye begins by addressing custody issues with ex-wife Kim Kardashian over their four children, while also claiming that banks are freezing his accounts. He claims he “became a Nazi yet b—h, I’m the villain” and includes toward the end of the song an audio clip of a German speech from Hitler. In the music video, a group of men chant, “All my n—as Nazis, n—as Heil Hitler.”

“Heil Hitler” is the seventh track on an upcoming album titled “WW3” that Ye teased in April. The cover art for the album features a man and a woman in red and white Ku Klux Klan robes. “Heil Hitler” is Ye’s latest promotion of Nazism, after he tried to sell shirts emblazoned with a swastika and made a series of antisemitic comments on X earlier this year. Those social media comments included repeated praise and admiration for Hitler. Ye even declared “Im a Nazi [sic]” and “I love Hitler.”

On Tuesday, the “Runaway” singer walked off the set of an interview with Piers Morgan, mere minutes into their conversation, after the host of “Piers Morgan Uncensored” was wrong about how many followers Ye has on X (formerly known as Twitter). Morgan was about to confront the Chicago rapper about some of his comments on X.

“You’re not gonna take inches off my d–k, bro,” Ye told Morgan before he stormed off. “I’m a gift, bro. Why do all you people in media act like you haven’t played my songs at your weddings, or graduations or at funerals or when your child was born?”

“You take someone like that’s living, like a [John] Lennon or a Michael Jackson. That nuance right there is idiotic. It just shows the hate that you put out for people that put out love. There’s so much love in the art that I put out. This is what you get for now, we can circle back when you can count.”

The post Kanye West Releases ‘Heil Hitler’ Song, Music Video Featuring Audio of Nazi Leader’s Speech first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Campus Antisemitism Documentary Seeks to Show Jewish Students as ‘Inspirational’ Heroes, Not Merely Victims

George Washington University student Sabrina Soffer talking on stage with Noa Tishby at a GWU event highlighted in “Blind Spot.” Photo: Screenshot

A film streaming online that focuses on American campus antisemitism is told from the viewpoint of Jewish college students who had firsthand experiences with antisemitic abuse and, instead of staying silent about their trauma, are at the forefront pushing for a better, more welcoming environment at their schools.

“Blind Spot” says it is the first and only film to exclusively spotlight the existence of campus antisemitism in the United States both before and after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led terrorist attack in southern Israel and the subsequent explosion of rabid, sometimes violent campus antisemitism following the massacre. It reveals how antisemitism on college and university campuses is a longstanding problem that started well before the Oct. 7 attack and explains what can be done to help students feel safer at their schools.

The movie is available for viewing on the YouTube pages of StandWithUs and the Jewish Broadcasting Service. It has surpassed 100,000 views on both channels since premiering less than a month ago. It was directed and co-produced by Seth Kramer, Daniel A. Miller, and Jeremy Newberger of Ironbound Films.

“Blind Spot” aims to show viewers that, while antisemitism has been on college campuses for years, people “didn’t realize it, didn’t see it, and they didn’t want to see it” before Oct. 7, said executive producer Lenny Gold, whose own son experienced antisemitism in school.

The film references the “blind spot” in the context of people and universities in favor of protecting every other minority group, except Jews. The film tries to highlight the “double standard” and “injustice” that Jews and pro-Israel supporters face on college campuses, Gold said.

“Why are other groups protected and not Jews?” Gold asked. “Jews are a protected group under [Title VI of] the Civil Rights Act. So why is the law not enforced? Why is society so out of step with what the law says and what American values it should be upholding.”

“On many college campuses, even people who are committed to the civil rights of every other group in this country, often have a blind spot when it comes to Jews,” Kenneth Marcus, founder and chairman of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights, said in the film. “While the problems have gotten worse and worse, young people are taking the initiative more and more, fighting antisemitism, taking charge themselves.”

Interviews with college students began in 2021, but “Blind Spot” does include footage from incidents dating back to 2019. Filming continued until well past the Oct. 7 attack in 2023. Gold said after the Hamas invasion, “we had to pivot from making a film to educate people about a problem that most people didn’t know about before, to basically making a film that says, ‘Well, we told you so. Now we’re gonna show you how we got here.’ When we looked back at the footage we shot before Oct. 7, we thought it was even greater now post-Oct. 7 because it was more impactful and relevant and familiar to people seeing it because they would now know on their own, that we have a serious problem on American campuses.”

More than two dozen students speak in the film about their personal experiences with antisemitism at their schools, including the University of Notre Dame; University of California, Berkeley, University of Vermont, George Washington University, Tulane University, University of Chicago, Tufts University, and Baruch College of the City University of New York (CUNY). The students discuss incidents that include verbal antisemitic abuse and threats – from both teachers and fellow students – physical violence, and being targeted in boycotts by anti-Israel students.

They also experienced emotional and mental trauma. A student at CUNY’s John Jay College of Criminal Justice talked in “Blind Spot” about being harassed by fellow students in stairwells at the school and in the gym, breaking down crying in the library from the torment and taking time off from class to cope with her trauma. Another student, from the University of Vermont, ultimately decided to transfer to the University of Florida because of the vast number of antisemitic incidents at his first school, Gold revealed to The Algemeiner. The filmmakers had to persuade the student to push through his trauma and return to UVM to film a segment about the abuse he experienced at the college, Gold added. In 2023, the US Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights ruled that UVM administrators failed to respond to several complaints of antisemitism, as well as anti-Zionist harassment and discrimination, at the school.

“I’ve stayed in touch with a number of the students, and my sense is that many of them were significantly affected. There is a definite sadness that I sense,” Gold said.

“Blind Spot” highlights the heartbreaking experiences these Jewish students endured. But it also draws attention to their bravery and courage in standing up against antisemitism, pushing for a change at their schools to make them more inclusive and safer environments, if not for themselves then for future students on campus.

The featured students are not portrayed as victims but as the heroes in their own stories. They are seen taking action to make their schools more welcoming and safer for Jewish students in areas where too many school administrators allegedly failed to act. “Blind Spot” says such students “are on the front lines of a modern-day civil rights movement,” and they include Yasmeen Ohebsion from Tulane University.

When she first appeared in the film, the Israeli-Persian student admitted that she “couldn’t muster up the courage” to speak out against a professor who required students to read a writing by an antisemitic author, who promoted the narrative that Israel is a white supremacist and apartheid state. By the end of “Blind Spot,” Ohebsion is seen testifying in Washington, DC, in March 2024 in front of the US House Committee on Education and the Workforce, urging policymakers to pressure school administrators to take action against anti-Israel hostility and violence on her campus and others. Ohebsion concluded her testimony by proclaiming “Am Israel Chai” (“Long Live Israel”).

“The first word that comes to my mind is: inspirational,” Gold said of Ohebsion and other students featured in “Blind Spot” during an interview with The Algemeiner. “I don’t know that I would’ve had what it took to do what they have done. I was just blown away by each and every one of them. Their pose, courage, brilliance, articulateness, and their decision to stand up rather than just keep their heads down and do nothing and say nothing. And without them, none of the other non-students in the film would be able to help them.”

As noted by Gold, “Blind Spot” also features interviews with many non-Jewish pro-Israel supporters who are allies of these students, including Forham University President Tania Tetlow, Tulane University student Raymell Green, US Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY), and Carly Gammill, director of legal policy at StandWithUs.

“Attorneys need clients. Without these students as clients, the attorneys would not be able to use the law as a tool to help the students,” Gold explained to The Algemeiner. “The students had to come forward first, and they had to do so knowing that their cases would likely not be resolved before they left school. These students knew they were doing it at best for students to come and not for themselves. And to have that kind of selflessness, at that age or any age, is just so inspirational to me and so notable. It just confirmed the wisdom of the conscious decision that we made from the beginning to tell this story through the eyes and voices of the students who were impacted by it.”

Others in the film who speak in support of the Jewish college students experiencing antisemitism is New York City Councilwoman Inna Vernikov; llya Bratman, executive director at the Hillel at Baruch College; Alyza Lewin, president of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights; Dr. Naya Lekht, a research fellow at the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy; and Susan Tuchman, director of the Center for Law and Justice at the Zionist Organization of America.

“We went out of our way to show scenes of adults talking to students, to show the mentorship and the attention to address their feelings and comfort them, encourage them and support them,” Gold said. “We tried to show that these students do have some support. It’s not necessarily coming from the people it should, like school administrators, but other people are stepping in.”

Gold said he and the co-producers of the “Blind Spot” have been discussing making a film focused solely on campus antisemitism for four years, starting at a time when it was “not well-known in America, among Jews and non-Jews, but we knew it was a serious problem.”

“So, we decided to look for a way of telling the story to educate, re-educate, and inspire as many people as possible,” he added. He said throughout the making of “Blind Spot,” he and his team were determined to make a film “that was beholden to nothing but the truth and nobody but the students … the focus was on the students – first, last and always.”

“Blind Spot” not only highlights the struggles Jewish students face on college and university campuses but also calls attention to some achievements that schools have made, such as Fordham University becoming the first school in late 2016 to refuse to recognize the anti-Zionist group Students for Justice in Palestine, a move that was then later mimicked by several other schools. “Blind Spot” also features interviews with CUNY Chancellor Felix Matos Rodríguez and CUNY Chairman of the Board of Trustees Bill Thompson in which they are boldly confronted about the rise of antisemitism on CUNY campuses and the lack of action taken to combat it. The facility among the CUNY schools includes two prominent anti-Zionist and anti-Israel professors who have made what critics have described as antisemitic remarks in the past – Peter Beinart and Marc Lamont Hill.

“The evil of indifference that seems to permeate this problem, is perhaps the most shocking,” Gold said, when talking about how he felt making “Blind Spot.”

“There’s hostility, but that’s been going on for ages. There’s ignorance, but that can fixed,” he added. “But in the 21st century America, after all we’ve been through – and I’m old enough to remember the civil rights movement and Jim Crow – here we are back in the Middle Ages when it comes to Jews. How can you be in favor of civil rights and social justice for all these other groups and not for one? When you explore that question, what we heard a lot from the students is about the evil of indifference … And when you consider that school officials, people who lead large and great universities committed to the ideals of open discussion and civil discourse, cannot recognize that one group is being subjected to a hostile learning environment and discrimination in and out of the classroom, it is shocking.”

Gold concluded by saying that “Blind Spot” is in part a call to action that hopefully will inspire other college students not to remain silent in the face of antisemitism at their schools.

“This film can show all the students, who can serve as role models for future generations of students, that you’re not alone if you’re facing this problem, and you can stand up to it,” ” Gold said. “Your Jewish identity is on the line. And if that’s important to you, these are the steps that you can take, this is what you might experience and there are resources available to you.”

Watch the trailer for “Blind Spot” below.

Note: The Algemeiner‘s campus correspondent, Dion J. Pierre, is featured in “Blind Spot.”



The post Campus Antisemitism Documentary Seeks to Show Jewish Students as ‘Inspirational’ Heroes, Not Merely Victims first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Pro-Hamas Protesters Clash With New York Police at Brooklyn College, Encampment Thwarted

Handcuffed man screams at law enforcement during a student-led protest against the ongoing war in Gaza at Brooklyn College on May 8, 2025, in Brooklyn, New York City. Photo: Michael Nigro/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect.

Pro-Hamas students clashed with the New York City Police Department (NYPD) on Thursday during an unauthorized demonstration at City University of New York, Brooklyn College, continuing a series of days in which law enforcement has been deployed to quell extremist disturbances.

As seen in footage captured by “FreedomNews.TV,” students rocked officers with blow after blow to obstruct their being arrested for trespassing, prompting as many as six others to rush in to help with detaining one person at a time. The melees are unlike any seen on a US college campus this semester.

The aim of the group was to establish a pro-Hamas encampment on the East Quad section of campus, which they called a “Liberated Zone,” and several reports said that it attempted to block the entrance to the Tanger Hillel House after being prevented from doing so. FreedomNews captured several more fights between protesters and officers which were filmed in front of the Hillel building, where Jewish students socialize and seek support from their community.

“Tanger Hillel at Brooklyn College is appalled by the anti-Israel protest and encampment that took place on May 8, 2025 and violated campus policies and feared deeply troubling antisemitic rhetoric, including chants of ‘Say it loud, say it clear, we don’t want no Zionists here,’ and banners with inverted red triangles, a symbol widely recognized as a call for violence,” Tanger Hillel told The Algemeiner in a statement. “Targeting Hillel, the Jewish student center, is not a peaceful protest. It is harassment, intimidation, and an antisemitic act of aggression.”

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.”

Brooklyn College told the New York Times on Thursday that it could not tolerate the group’s attempting to occupy the East Quad for an extended period of time, for which it appeared to be preparing by pitching tents. The students, a spokesman said, had been given “repeated warnings” to decamp and relocate their activities away from campus.

“The safety of our campus community will always be paramount, and Brooklyn College respects the right to protest while also adhering to strict rules meant to ensure the safe operation of our university,” he told the paper.

Law enforcement arrested a total of seven students, according to a local outlet, PIX11. The campus was later closed after successfully repelling the encampment.

Brooklyn College is one of several schools to foreclose the possibility of pro-Hamas students commandeering sections of campus for an extended period of time in recent weeks. Swarthmore College, Columbia University, and the University of Washington (UW) all did so between Saturday and Wednesday, securing arrests of over 100 students combined.

At Columbia University a pro-Hamas student group, Apartheid Divest (CUAD), occupied the school’s Butler Library and vowed not to leave unless school officials acceded to a list of five demands calling for, among other things, a boycott of Israel and divestment from armaments manufacturers.

According to The Columbia Spectator, the demonstration soon faltered after CUAD was out maneuvered by Columbia’s private security forces, who effectively detained the students inside the Butler Reading Room by locking it from the outsider to prevent others, including faculty who wished to offer themselves as “mediators,” from coming in. Meanwhile, the Spectator said, the university dispatched a team of “special patrol officers” and others who initiated negotiations to end the occupation but were unsuccessful.

Having reached an impasse, interim Columbia University president Claire Shipman — the school’s third new chief executive in two years — requested the help of the NYPD, a decision she justified in a statement as “necessary” for preserving Columbia’s academic mission. By the time the remarks were published, two Columbia officers had been assaulted by a crush of agitators who resolved to enter Butler by storming it.

The NYPD’s operation to clear Butler was quickly completed after officers arrived there at 7:25 pm, the time cited by the Spectator. Bundling them “20 at a time,” the officers relocated the students to an NYPD bus used for mass arrests. According to the last numbers, 80 people — students, non-students, and alumni — were arrested and issued court notices.

On Friday, the New York Post reported that Columbia has begun meting out disciplinary sanctions to those who participated in seizing Butler Library. Some 65 students have been suspended, the paper said, while 33 alumni and other persons have been banned from campus. According to Fox News, the US Department of Homeland Security has enquired about the immigration status of those involved, as Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said that he intends to revoke the visas of any who are visiting students.

“We are reviewing the via status of the trespassers and vandals who took over Columbia University’s library,” Rubio said, writing on the X social media platform. “Pro-Hamas thugs are no longer welcome in our great nation.”

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.

The post Pro-Hamas Protesters Clash With New York Police at Brooklyn College, Encampment Thwarted first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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