The CUNY Encampment

On 4/28/24, IDF veteran Sam Fried attempted to enter the public campus of CUNY with a single goal: to engage in constructive dialogue for peace with anti-Israel protestors. Unfortunately, those same protestors not only refused to speak with Sam, but also illegally blocked him from accessing his alma mater’s campus.

This is his statement:

I willingly enter into the lion’s den — ultimately to protect innocent people. Whether on the physical battlefield in the depths of Gaza, or on the ideological battlefield of my Alma Mater’s campus, the goal is always the same: to work towards a better future for us all. It does not matter who we are — Jew or Muslim; Palestinian or Israeli — we are all the same and all worth protecting. I enter with open arms, and the slogan of “dialogue for peace”.

I was looking for a partner in that peace. I was looking for rational people, who might work towards a shared brighter future for ourselves and our children: one of coexistence, absent of hate.

I did not find any partners for peace.

Instead, I was harassed with antisemitic slurs like “k*ke” and “Nazi”. I was subjected to calls for an “intifada revolution” — a call to kill Jews everywhere. When I mentioned suicide bombings, students laughed. They justified the massacre of Israeli civilians on October 7th with the despicable logic that “those people are not innocent, they are settlers.” And they physically barred me from entering campus: a public school from which I graduated, and which is funded publicly by all of our tax dollars.

After finding no one willing to speak rationally, I left freely, of my own accord. But on the way out, the police grabbed me, as if I had done something wrong by attempting to enter a public location. Was my crime that I tried to pursue peace in a lion’s den? Or was it the same old crime that my ancestors have been guilty of for millennia…that we are proud Jews?

I will not stop my fight to find a partner(s) in peace, because peace is worth fighting for, and inshallah we will get there. One dialogue at a time. But most of all, I will never stop being a proud Jew.

Am Yisrael Chai.

This video was filmed and edited by Omry Hananya, with assistance from Alex Horn.