Former Gov. David Paterson — a Columbia University graduate — said he is supporting the Jewish community amid anti-Israel protests at his alma mater — not least because Jewish people supported Martin Luther King Jr.’s fight for civil rights.
“They deserve some kind of support … Back in the ’60s when Martin Luther King was marching on Washington, and he was fighting for civil rights, and he was challenging many of the segregation policies that still exist in this country, you would’ve thought that he was a terrorist the way they referred to him,” Paterson said on WABC 770 AM radio’s The Cats Roundtable Sunday.
He added: “Sixty five percent of the whites who marched with Dr. King were Jewish … They deserve somebody to stand with them [today]. I’m happy to do it,” Paterson said.
Paterson acknowledged the humanitarian crisis for Palestinians in Gaza as Israel’s military tries to root out the Hamas terrorists in response for the October 7th attack.
However, he told WABC host John Catsimatidis that the horrific attack on southern Israel that killed 1,200 people remains the root of the conflict.
But he added that the Palestinians partly brought the problem on themselves by electing Hamas as their ruling government in Gaza.
“The Palestinians voted for Hamas to actually run in a sense the government in that particular area. This a government whose stated purpose is to destroy the State of Israel,” Paterson said.
“How much clearer can you get that they are the enemy,” he said.
He said the protests now are more divisive, hostile and hateful because they pit students against other students, and he claimed that they appear to be organized by off-campus radicals.
“Outside agitators are always waiting to get involved in these situations. They did it so quickly this time that I am very suspicious about where all of this is coming from. There is a kind of an anarchist flavor to what’s going on these days,” the ex-governor, a Democrat, said.
Paterson also said the Ivy League presidents seemed to be caught-flat footed, and haven’t helped their cause by appearing wooden during testimony on the strife during congressional hearings.
“When you go to these hearings, show some humanity. Show some emotion about what happened [on your campus] … Don’t sit there like you’re at a house closing … That’s where they got in a lot of trouble,” Paterson said.
Disastrous testimony before House members about campus antisemitism — and the resulting backlash — contributed to the ouster of former Harvard president Claudine Gay and University of Pennsylvania president Liz Magill.
Columbia president Manouche Shafik is now on the hot seat, with Jewish students saying they feel threatened after anti-Israel protesters set up an encampment on the Morningside Height campus.
