‘COWARDLY’: NYC university chancellor skips hearing on antisemitism on campus

“Last night, in a very cowardly fashion, the chancellor said he won’t appear. What a sham, what an insult to the Jewish community of New York,” said Brooklyn Councilwoman Inna Vernikov.

By World Israel News Staff

CUNY Chancellor Felix Matos Rodriguez failed to show up at a hearing Thursday regarding antisemitism on its campuses, instead sending a lawyer to represent him, the New York Post reported.

The turnout at the Council’s Higher Education Committee hearing, titled “Examining Antisemitism on College,” was well-attended, with students and teachers who suffered antisemitic abuse providing testimony.

“Last night, in a very cowardly fashion, the chancellor said he won’t appear. Instead he sent a lawyer to represent him. What a sham, what an insult to the Jewish community of New York,” said Brooklyn Councilwoman Inna Vernikov, the Post reported.

“Amazing turnout today on the steps of city hall for the press conference on systemic Jew hatred at @cunyedu,” said Brooke Goldstein, director of The Lawfare Project and an End Jew Hatred activist.

“It’s disgusting that the CUNY chancellor refused to show up today, when the hearing was rescheduled just to accommodate him.

“He should resign,” she stated.

“When it comes to Jews, do Jewish lives matter?” asked Vernikov, a Ukranian-born Jew who is the ranking Republican on the Council’s Education Committee, according to the Post.

Among those who testified was former CUNY School of Law student Rafaella Gunz, who said she transferred to Yeshiva University because she “feared for my physical and emotional well-being,” the report said.

“It is horrible for Jews on campus,” declared Michael Goldstein, an adjunct professor of Communications and Government Relations at CUNY’s Kingsborough Community College in Brooklyn whose father, the late Leon Goldstein, was the school’s president for 29 years and the man who built the college’s modern-day campus.

In February 2019, Goldstein wrote in an article published in the New York Daily News saying he was the victim of “a systematic and pernicious campaign in which I have been targeted and harassed because of who I am and what I believe.” Goldstein is “Jewish, politically conservative, and I believe in Zionism, the civil rights movement of the Jewish people.”