Hillel at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y., advised Jewish students to avoid 104 West, the campus kosher dining hall, on Sunday “out of an abundance of caution” following online threats that included: “If I see a pig male Jew, I will stab you and slit your throat,” “Eliminate Jewish living from Cornell campus” and “Gonna shoot up 104 West.”
The threats were made on a website called GreekRank.
Hillel stated on Sunday that both it and the university administration were aware of the threats at the Ivy League institution and that the university’s police department was on site “to provide additional security as a precaution.”
“At this time, we advise that students and staff avoid the building out of an abundance of caution,” stated Cornell Hillel. “We will continue to provide updates as additional information becomes available.”
Where the students would eat was not suggested.
Some 3,000 Jewish undergraduates and 500 graduate students make up about 22% of the student body.
Hillel’s Instagram page, where it posted that message, has not updated the situation.
Anti-Israel messages such as “Israel is fascist” and “Zionism = genocide” were also spray-painted on campus, reported the student paper, The Cornell Daily Sun.
“The university has responded by making the usual noises about not tolerating antisemitism—but has cravenly advised staff and students to avoid that dining hall,” wrote the editorial board of the New York Post. “In other words, the school caved to the hate-spewers, taking a step toward precisely what one demanded: the elimination of Jewish living from the Cornell campus.”
In a statement on the university website that does not appear on the home page, Cornell president Martha Pollack referred to “a series of horrendous, antisemitic messages threatening violence to our Jewish community and specifically naming 104 West—the home of the Center for Jewish Living” posted “on a website unaffiliated with Cornell.”
“Law enforcement was immediately notified,” she stated.
Pollack added that Cornell police contacted the FBI “of a potential hate crime.”
