Amid hostile chant of "Intifada! Intifada! Long live intifada!” and “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free!” dozens of anti-Israel protesters disrupted a lecture from Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat at San Francisco State University on Wednesday.
Waving a Palestinian flag, the activists denounced Israel as a “terrorist” and “apartheid” state, and demanded an end to the “Israeli occupation,” and that Barkat leave the campus.
Barkat, who recently joined Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud Party, and is rumored to be considering a run for the premiership, is on a US campus lecture tour to discuss Jerusalem and Israel’s policies, security, and coexistence with Palestinian citizens.
Undeterred by the hecklers, the mayor attempted to continue his speech and engage his student audience by answering their questions, the Jerusalem Municipality said in a statement on Thursday, which was accompanied by a 22-second video of the disruption.
“Anyone who thinks that calls for violence and incitement will be able to silence us or divert us from our position is mistaken,” Barkat said in response to the incident.
“We will continue to build, develop and strengthen the State of Israel, and within it a united Jerusalem, and we will continue to voice our opinions and our legitimacy when we are invited to do so, even in places where they try to stop us.”
Barkat added that he spoke about the protesters’ “shameful conduct” with both the university’s president, Leslie E. Wong, and San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee.
“I told them that they must not allow dangerous incitement like this in a democratic country in general, and on campuses in particular,” said Barkat, who is scheduled to speak on Thursday at New York’s Columbia University.
Barkat is on a campus lecture tour in the US to discuss different matters related to Israeli and al-Quds and will next make a stop at Columbia University in New York.
The protests come amid heightened tensions in the occupied Palestinian territories due to Israel’s imposition in August 2015 of restrictions on the entry of Palestinian worshipers into the al-Aqsa Mosque compound in East al-Quds.
Backed by Israeli forces, illegal Israeli settlers have also been violating the compound of the al-Aqsa Mosque as well as Palestinian properties in al-Quds.
At least 210 Palestinians, including women and children, have lost their lives at the hands of Israeli forces since October last year.
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source : Agencies
Friday
8 April 2016
10:43:50 AM
745937
Amid hostile chant of "Intifada! Intifada! Long live intifada!” and “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free!” dozens of anti-Israel protesters disrupted a lecture from Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat at San Francisco State University on Wednesday.