Prof urges students to 'finish off' anti-Sharia protesters
Boasting that "we almost have the fascists on the run," Cloud sent a tweet calling for "Syracuse people" to "come down to the federal building to finish them off."
Syracuse University communications professor Dana Cloud recently issued a veiled call for violence against a conservative group that was holding an anti-Sharia law demonstration.
A Syracuse University professor recently urged students and colleagues to help “finish...off” the “fascists” who were demonstrating against Sharia law.
According to NPR, the Syracuse rally was marked by tensions between the anti-Sharia protesters—many of whom reportedly dressed in military-style fatigues—and self-styled “anti-fascist” (a.k.a., “antifa”) counter-protesters wearing face masks and carrying flags.
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“We almost have the fascists in [sic] on the run,” Professor Dana Cloud tweeted Saturday, referring to the local “March Against Sharia” demonstration taking place that day. “Syracuse people come down to the federal building to finish them off.”
A self-proclaimed socialist, Cloud has been featured on Turning Point USA’s Professor Watchlist for blaming the U.S. for 9/11 and for rewriting the Pledge of Allegiance to the people of Iraq, Palestine and Afghanistan.
The “March Against Sharia” protests, organized by a pro-Donald Trump organization called ACT for America, have been met with resistance from “antifa” groups who contend that the group is using the threat of Sharia as a pretext to stoke anti-Muslim bias, though ACT maintains that it is merely drawing attention to the threat of incorporating elements of Sharia into the American justice system.
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Lisa Joseph, who organized the ACT event in Syracuse, asserted that while she is not aware of any specific instances in which Sharia law has been implemented in this country, ACT is committed to “guarding against it” in order to ensure that “radical Islamist ideology [does] not hijack the peaceful Muslims here in this country”—a sentiment echoed by Syracuse student Ryan Dunn.
“People think it’s a legal system that Muslims are trying to impose on Americans,” Dunn told Campus Reform. “However, no one wants America governed by Sharia law, including American Muslims.”
The Syracuse Post-Standard reports that no violence took place at the local demonstration, though demonstrators on both sides engaged in a prolonged shouting match from opposite sides of a street.
Campus Reform reached out to professor Cloud, but did not get a response in time for publication.
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