Columbia University protester calls Jewish donor a 'Nazi' in disgraceful clash trends now
A Palestine protester outside Columbia University branded a Jewish donor a 'Nazi' in a heated exchange on Wednesday as tensions at the school flared.
The donor, who gave his name only as Elliot, told DailyMail.com he was a 76-year-old lawyer who'd been contributing to the university for years after studying at Columbia Law in the 1960s.
He recalled protesting the Vietnam war and said he was only curious about today's protest when he heard the crowd chanting 'from the river to the sea', and demanding the entire state of Israel.
When he approached the crowd on 116th Street, the middle aged man in a keffiyeh screamed: 'I’m not going to talk to a f***ing Nazi’.
While he supports the next generation of students’ right to demonstrate, he felt many have been ‘crossing the line’ by making Jewish students fear for their safety.
The donor, who gave his name only as Elliot, told DailyMail.com he was a 76-year-old lawyer who'd been contributing to the university for years after studying at Columbia Law in the 1960s
A middle aged man with a keffiyeh wrapped around his head called the Jewish donor a Nazi
‘Protest all you want, and say that the Zionist regime should be abolished - which I don’t agree with - but don’t make people feel unsafe because of their ethnicity.
'There’s no possible justification for that.’
Elliot added that he’s ’a big fan of Columbia for many reasons’ and he donates a ‘small amount’ to his Alma mater each year.
He said Columbia President Minouche Shafik, who has called for the ‘Gaza plaza’ encampment to disperse, was doing ‘as good a job as she can’.
‘It’s a very tough spot that she’s in,’ he said, adding that he was inclined to increase his donation to the university this year.
People participate in a pro-Palestinian demonstration outside Columbia University in New York, the United States, on April 23, 2024
The Columbia encampment, launched last week, sparked similar demonstrations at college campuses across the country, including Yale, Boston and Michigan universities.
Today, students in Austin and USC in California also came to blows.
Dozens of cops clad in riot gear were patrolling the Columbia campus perimeter Wednesday while security guards barred
