Angry Activists at Columbia U Protest Indigenous Peoples Event Highlighting Historical Jewish Ties

Activists at Columbia University staged a walkout at an event Tuesday evening — at which The Algemeiner was present — as a Jew addressed the room to describe his connection to the land of Israel.

The protesters, part of a coalition of 26 campus groups — including Columbia University Apartheid Divest, the Black Students Organization, the Muslim Students Association and the Columbia Queer Alliance — had arrived to disrupt the event, called “Indigenous People Unite,” sponsored by the Columbia chapter of Students Supporting Israel (SSI) and featuring Assyrian, Yazidi, Israelite, Native Canadian and Tibetan speakers.

As Rudy Rochman, the president of Columbia’s SSI chapter, told The Algemeiner reported on Sunday, the event was organized for the purpose of “reclaiming the narrative” on campus about the ancient connection of the Jewish people to the land of Israel — a historical fact that has been denied by enemies of the Zionist enterprise.