Student who called for Israel's abolishment gives speech at CUNY

Nerdeen Kiswani, the student who gave the speech, has amassed over 15,000 followers on Instagram. She created the pro-Palestinian Authority advocacy group Within Our Lifetime, which has held rallies calling to “globalize the Intifada.”
 

During her speech, which focused on the “Palestinian” cause, Kiswani said that she is “facing a campaign of Zionist harassment by well-funded organizations with ties to the Israeli government and military on the basis of my Palestinian identity and organizing.” In a video of the speech, thunderous applause can be heard.

Ilya Bratman, executive director of Hillel at Baruch College, said that the student government at CUNY School of Law elected her as the speaker.

“The president [of the student government] is Jewish,” Bratman said. “But that doesn’t mean anything. The student government is completely intertwined with Kiswani and her efforts to demonize the state of Israel.”

“I’m banned from my homeland for as long as this Zionist settler entity, this organization called Israel, masquerading as a country, continues to exist,” Kiswani said in a YouTube interview in May 2021. “We had peace before Israel was created, so abolishing Israel is the key to peace.”

Kiswani has refused interview requests from the New York Jewish Week multiple times, calling the organization a member of the “Zionist media.”

A professor at CUNY who is also a member of the New York chapter of the pro-Palestinian Authority group Jewish Voice for Peace said that Kiswani is “intelligent, honorable, and courageous.”

“I think that attempts to tarnish her or her reputation are slander and ugly,” said the professor, who said they feared being fired from the school for speaking to the press.