A letter from the Columbia alumni association and my response
I received the following email last night from the Columbia alumni association in Israel:Dear Alumni,The following is my response (on which Lee Bollinger - the President of Columbia - was copied):
You may have heard by now that Columbia University invited Ahmadinejad, President of Iran, to speak at Columbia University tomorrow, Sept 24th. See link below for SIPA announcement of this.
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/news/07/09/sipa.pdf
you can make your E-protest : modify the letter below, or make your own, and send to President Bollinger (bollinger@columbia.edu)
Dear President Bollinger:
My name is _____________ , Columbia Business School _____. I was extremely displeased, and maddened, when I learned of the invitation given to President Ahmadinejad to speak at the University.
With or without hindsight, would you have invited Hitler to speak in 1935?
This is a man who calls for the destruction of my country, Israel, threatening to wipe us off the map. By inviting him you grant legitimacy to him and his obsessive ideas. This person, and people like him, must be isolated and shown that their ideas have no place among civilized
peoples.
If you go through with your plans to have him appear as a guest of Columbia, I have no choice but to refuse any more support of Columbia.
Respectfully,
______________
Ofer,
The university has already said they would have invited Hitler.
In fact, if you read the post linked above, you will see that the university DID invite representatives of the Nazi party in the 1930's.
There are two responses. One is to be ashamed. I am ashamed of Columbia. I am ashamed that I went to a school that encourages genocide of the Jewish people.
The other response is the one you suggested - to stop donating any money we might have donated to Columbia until now. I will never give Columbia one red cent. Never.
Carl in Jerusalem
Columbia College, 1978
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 8:34 AM
2 Comments:
you may be interested to read the following:
Columbia Alum Freed in Advance of Ahmadinejad's Speech
(CNSNews.com) - The president of Columbia University is expressing relief that a Columbia alumnus was released from an Iranian prison - just a few days before the Iranian president is scheduled to visit Columbia University. Dr. Kian Tajbakhsh, who works for George Soros's Open Society Institute, was one of several Iranian-Americans detained by Iran for allegedly conspiring against Iran's national security. Tajbakhsh was freed on bail last Thursday.
Columbia University President Lee C. Bollinger said he told the Iranian government that he would raise Tajbakhsh's case, "among many other issues, directly and publicly if President Ahmadinejad came to speak on our campus."
http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewNation.asp?Page=/Nation/archive/200709/NAT20070924a.html
Thus far this morning, Hillel seems to be winning the on-campus propaganda war, in quantity if not in size, to the pro-Iranian contingent. But it's still early and before the protest and presumable counter-protest.
Alma mater would weep were she able.
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