The New York University student leader who sent a pro-Hamas message has doubled down on the incendiary rhetoric – despite facing removal as president of the school’s Student Bar Association and losing a lucrative job offer.
Ryna Workman, who identifies as non-binary and uses them and they pronouns, said they’d had a “terrible” week since penning a column in the school’s newsletter accusing Israel of holding “full responsibility” for the terrorist attack that claimed at least 1,400 lives.
Despite the intense pushback, Workman told The Intercept they will “continue to speak out and show up.”
“What’s been driving me is the resilience of Palestinians in this moment,” Workman told the outlet in their first media interview since the scandal.
“The fact that they are still using their voice, that they are still standing strong, that they are still here, and that they are asking us to continue to speak out and show up for them through this and to not let this be their end,” they said.
“And so for me, I will continue to speak out for them and ask for these demands of an immediate ceasefire and this provision of this humanitarian assistance in a safe, secure, and timely fashion to the people of Gaza,” Workman added.
In a statement Monday, Workman described the blowback to their newsletter as deflecting from what’s really important.
“Regardless of how terrible my week has been, this attention on one student’s email to their fellow law students is entirely misplaced and a dangerous distraction,” Workman said, citing Israel’s 24-hour evacuation order to people in northern Gaza, and its moves to cut off food, water and electricity.
Last week, members of the Student Bar Association released a statement saying they did not “write, approve, or see this message” before it was published, adding that Workman did not speak for them.
The SBA board moved to remove Workman as president, a process that will require a couple of hearings, according to the statement, which claimed students were being doxxed, harassed and threatened with death after the posting was made.
Workman’s newsletter also cost them a cushy job at Chicago’s Winston & Strawn firm, which rescinded its offer amid mounting outrage.
The law school also released a statement that sought to make “several things abundantly clear on behalf of the NYU Law Board of Trustees and our Law School as a whole.”
“NYU Law unequivocally condemns the recent terrorist acts and the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas in Israel. The murder and kidnapping of civilians, and the use of sexual violence and the separation and torture of children, are all abominable and atrocious,” the statement said.
“We want to say, loud and clear, to our community: Any statement that does not recognize this brutality does not reflect the values of NYU Law,” it added.
In their interview with The Intercept, Workman said: “I am concerned that this backlash against me and other people who have spoken out as well will have this chilling effect that allows for this unbalanced and dangerous media narrative to continue in which violence against Palestinian civilians is normalized.”