Associate Professor Jake Lynch, a member of Sydney Staff for Boycott Divestment and Sanctions (BDS), was assaulted by an elderly Zionist woman during a demonstration in support of Palestine on March 11.
The assault occurred at Sydney University, during a pro-Israel talk given by Colonel Richard Kemp, a former commander of the British forces in Afghanistan and supporter of Israel.
Demonstrators interrupted Kemp’s talk, targeting his support for the Israeli occupation in Palestine, chanting “Richard Kemp, you can’t hide, you support genocide.”
Lynch told Green Left Weekly that the woman assaulted him after he “left his seat to remonstrate with the guards” who were “picking up the students bodily and pushing them out the door”. He said he did so because he did “not believe the students were endangering anyone”.
He said the woman became unsettled by the commotion and began pouring “water over people’s heads and using industrial language.” She then kicked Lynch twice and “caught [him] in the groin”.
He said that after many failed attempts to get the security guard to intervene he “finally had the idea to show her the banknotes [he] was carrying in his pocket to make the point that [he] would have no choice but to take out a private prosecution for assault”.
A student protester and member of Resistance: Young Socialist Alliance said: “The woman was clearly a Zionist who, without warrant, carried out an attack against Lynch.
“I am disappointed by the mainstream media’s blatantly biased coverage of this protest.”
Kemp has previously said that Israeli air strikes on Hamas are to “protect civilians” despite the deaths of 2200 civilians last year and that “people should be extremely proud of the state of Israel.”
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