Sunday, May 05, 2024

What lessons are taught?

Professor Marianne Hirsch draws on her fifty years of teaching experience in her letter to the editors of THE COLUMBIA SPECTATOR: 


At the same time, in doing all of this I have often been left exhausted and depleted—and never more so than in April and May 2024. That exhaustion comes not from the myriad tasks that come with the job, but from the ways in which the administrations of the institutions where I have taught have impeded me and my colleagues from doing our work. It did not take long for me to learn, even as a beginning instructor in my mid-twenties, that despite empty well-worn rhetoric, presidents and trustees often sacrifice their University’s pedagogical mission to financial priorities, pleasing donors and protecting investments.

This relinquishing of education is now more blatantly obvious than ever. My fellow faculty and I believe in, defend, and want to carry out the educational charge to which the University commits itself in theory in every public communication, but hinders in fact. I speak not only of the fact that the Columbia administration has sealed its campus; kept faculty out of our offices, classrooms, and libraries; sowed untold anxiety, fear, and depression in its communities; and created a circus that has attracted truly dangerous individuals and groups—such as the one led by Sean Feucht—to the neighborhood where we live, work, and raise our children. In addition to all of this, I am also speaking about the actual lessons the upper administration has taught our young students during this year.

Let me briefly describe a few of the most disturbing among them.

First, that University rules and procedures—whether longstanding and instituted through shared governance, or unilaterally changed by administrators—apply to students and faculty, for whom infringement results in severe punishment, up to and including arrest. Respect and observance of these rules and procedures do not, however, apply to administrators, who can violate University policy and lie about it both on campus and in front of Congress. In practice, they have done this on many occasions: When the New York Police Department was called to campus twice despite explicit objection by the University Senate, University President Minouche Shafik and the administration defied the spirit of shared governance. When members of the Task Force on Antisemitism chose and publicly explained their decision not to adopt a definition of antisemitism, Shafik, the two chairs of the board of trustees, and David Schizer, co-chair of the task force, denied that fact before Congress.

Second, that the University is willing to put students, faculty, and residents of its surrounding neighborhoods in harm’s way. Under the mendacious pretext of safety and security, they expose all of us to brutal armed riot police on campus before and after arrest; lock us in such that to make quick exit in case of emergency would be absolutely impossible; stoke the flames of division, fear, anxiety, and hatred in our community while proclaiming their intent to quell them; and allow for the doxxing and harassment of faculty and students exercising their right to peaceful protest.


Use the link to read all five of the disturbing 'lessons' the university taught with their attack on the students.  What Columbia University mainly taught via the president's actions was violence -- specifically that violence is the answer in any situation.  In doing that, Nemat Shafik echoed the tactics and crimes of Benjamin Netanyahu.   THE NATIONAL reports:


Twenty-two people, including eight children, were killed in overnight Israeli air strikes on Gaza's southern city of Rafah.

Eleven homes were struck in the bombardment that began on Sunday evening, the official Wafa news agency reported.

Nine people, including four children, were killed in a single strike on the Qishta family home in Rafah's Al Salam neighbourhood.

Another four Palestinians were killed in a strike on a home in the Al Geneina neighbourhood, while a baby was among four others killed in another strike on the city.


The violence continues.  War Criminal Netanyahu doesn't care and doesn't plan to end the assault. Josh Marcus (INDEPENDENT) notes, "As Israeli began observering its annual Holocaust Remembrance Day on Sunday, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated his opposition to the key planks of a potential ceasfire with Hamas, further indicating Israel is preparing to go forward with an invasion of Rafah in southern Gaza that will likely kill untold numbers of civilians."  What's the answer now? AFP reports:


The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) denounced a "genocide" in Gaza, urging its 57 member countries to impose sanctions on Israel in a resolution adopted at the end of its Gambia summit.

The organisation called on its members to impose "sanctions on Israel, the occupying power, and halting the export of weapons and ammunition used by its army to perpetrate the crime of genocide in Gaza".


And  Andrew England and James Shotter (THE FINANCIAL TIMES OF LONDON) report on the confusion and disagreements over security in occupied Palestine if and when the assault ends.


As governments continue to fail in any real effort to end the assault, students step up.  CNN’s Paradise Afshar reports:


Some students at Princeton University in New Jersey have launched a hunger strike “in solidarity with Gaza,” according to a student protest group.

Princeton Israeli Apartheid Divest said that participants in the strike would refrain from all food and drink – except water – until their demands were met.

Protesters are demanding the university disclose all its investments, divest from companies that “profit from or engage” in Israel’s “ongoing military campaign, occupation and apartheid policies,” and commit to “a full academic and cultural boycott of Israel.”

The students also want assurances that protesters will have “complete amnesty” from all criminal and disciplinary charges and that bans and evictions against student protesters will be reversed.

At least 17 undergraduate students were taking part in the hunger strike as of Sunday, according to student newspaper the Daily Princetonian.


Actions taken as the US government remains inactive.  For over a month, US President Joe Biden has insisted that the Israeli government could not attack Rafah without a plausible plan presented on how civilians would be protected.  No such plan has been presented.  But Paul Goldman and Rudy Chinchilla (NBC NEWS) report:

 

Israeli forces on Monday began instructing people in eastern portions of Rafah to move into a humanitarian zone, potentially signaling preparations for a ground invasion of the southern Gaza city.

The call for Palestinians to move was confirmed by the Israel Defense Forces, which included a map of the humanitarian area. "Calls to temporarily move to the humanitarian area will be conveyed through posters, SMS messages, phone calls and media broadcasts in Arabic," the IDF said in a statement.

A possible ground offensive in Rafah has been widely condemned internationally, with United Nations officials warning that it would increase the civilian death toll and worsen the humanitarian crisis in the enclave.

The move also comes despite President Joe Biden repeatedly stating U.S. opposition to an invasion of Rafah, where the population has swelled to an estimated 1.4 million people following Israel’s offensive in Gaza in retaliation for Hamas’ deadly attack on Israel and the taking of hostages on Oct. 7.

The Biden administration has threatened consequences for Israel should it move forward with a military assault without a credible plan to safeguard civilians in Rafah, which had a prewar population of around 250,000. 


Threats with no real follow up have been what the White House has offered for seven months now.  


Gaza remains under assault. Day 212 of  the assault in the wave that began in October.  Binoy Kampmark (DISSIDENT VOICE) points out, "Bloodletting as form; murder as fashion.  The ongoing campaign in Gaza by Israel’s Defence Forces continues without stalling and restriction.  But the burgeoning number of corpses is starting to become a challenge for the propaganda outlets:  How to justify it?  Fortunately for Israel, the United States, its unqualified defender, is happy to provide cover for murder covered in the sheath of self-defence."   CNN has explained, "The Gaza Strip is 'the most dangerous place' in the world to be a child, according to the executive director of the United Nations Children's Fund."  ABC NEWS quotes UNICEF's December 9th statement, ""The Gaza Strip is the most dangerous place in the world to be a child. Scores of children are reportedly being killed and injured on a daily basis. Entire neighborhoods, where children used to play and go to school have been turned into stacks of rubble, with no life in them."  NBC NEWS notes, "Strong majorities of all voters in the U.S. disapprove of President Joe Biden’s handling of foreign policy and the Israel-Hamas war, according to the latest national NBC News poll. The erosion is most pronounced among Democrats, a majority of whom believe Israel has gone too far in its military action in Gaza."  The slaughter continues.  It has displaced over 1 million people per the US Congressional Research Service.  Jessica Corbett (COMMON DREAMS) points out, "Academics and legal experts around the world, including Holocaust scholars, have condemned the six-week Israeli assault of Gaza as genocide."   The death toll of Palestinians in Gaza is grows higher and higher.  United Nations Women noted, "More than 1.9 million people -- 85 per cent of the total population of Gaza -- have been displaced, including what UN Women estimates to be nearly 1 million women and girls. The entire population of Gaza -- roughly 2.2 million people -- are in crisis levels of acute food insecurity or worse."  THE NATIONAL notes, "Gaza death toll reaches 34,683, with 78,018 injured."  Months ago,  AP  noted, "About 4,000 people are reported missing."  February 7th, Jeremy Scahill explained on DEMOCRACY NOW! that "there’s an estimated 7,000 or 8,000 Palestinians missing, many of them in graves that are the rubble of their former home."  February 5th, the United Nations' Phillipe Lazzarini Tweeted:

 



April 11th, Sharon Zhang (TRUTHOUT) reported, "In addition to the over 34,000 Palestinians who have been counted as killed in Israel’s genocidal assault so far, there are 13,000 Palestinians in Gaza who are missing, a humanitarian aid group has estimated, either buried in rubble or mass graves or disappeared into Israeli prisons.  In a report released Thursday, Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor said that the estimate is based on initial reports and that the actual number of people missing is likely even higher."
 

As for the area itself?  Isabele Debre (AP) reveals, "Israel’s military offensive has turned much of northern Gaza into an uninhabitable moonscape. Whole neighborhoods have been erased. Homes, schools and hospitals have been blasted by airstrikes and scorched by tank fire. Some buildings are still standing, but most are battered shells."  Kieron Monks (I NEWS) reports, "More than 40 per cent of the buildings in northern Gaza have been damaged or destroyed, according to a new study of satellite imagery by US researchers Jamon Van Den Hoek from Oregon State University and Corey Scher at the City University of New York. The UN gave a figure of 45 per cent of housing destroyed or damaged across the strip in less than six weeks. The rate of destruction is among the highest of any conflict since the Second World War."


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