A New York professor who described Hamas’ attack on Israeli citizens as “exhilarating” and “energizing” has taken a leave of absence.
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Russell Rickford, an associate professor of history at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y., went viral after video showed his emphatic, enthusiastic words about the terrorist organization’s Oct. 7 massacre.
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“It was exhilarating,” Rickford declared during a pro-Palestinian rally. “It was exhilarating, it was energizing.”
While he claimed to “abhor violence” and “abhor the targeting of civilians,” he celebrated that Palestinians were finally “able to breathe” for the first time in years.
Rickford added at the time: “And if they weren’t exhilarated by this challenge to the monopoly of violence, by this shifting of the balance of power, then they would not be human.”
An Oct. 17 statement signed by Cornell President Martha Pollack and university board chair Kraig Kayser condemned Rickford’s remarks.
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“This is a reprehensible comment that demonstrates no regard whatsoever for humanity,” Pollack and Kayser wrote. “The university is taking this incident seriously and is currently reviewing it consistent with our procedures.”
Three days later, Rickford went on leave, the Ivy League school’s campus newspaper, the Cornell Review, confirmed.
Rickford’s students learned of his leave last week after his replacement, professor Tamika Nunley, sent an email that she would be taking over one of his classes.
“Professor Rickford will be taking a leave of absence and I will assume teaching responsibilities for this course for the remainder of the semester,” she wrote the students in an email obtained by the Review.
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Rickford initially stood by his comments before issuing an apology through the Cornell Daily Sun for the “horrible choice of words” he used during his speech that was “intended to stress grassroots African American, Jewish and Palestinian traditions of resistance to oppression.”
He reiterated his abhorrence of violence and “the violent targeting of civilians” and apologized for his “reckless remarks… in this time of suffering,” in his Oct. 15 statement.
“As a scholar, a teacher, an activist and a father, I strive to uphold the values of human dignity, peace and justice,” Rickford added.
“I want to make it clear that I unequivocally oppose and denounce racism, anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, militarism, fundamentalism and all systems that dehumanize, divide and oppress people.”
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