An anti-Israel professor who previously held a machete to a reporter's neck has been fired from Cooper Union College after sharing a post featuring an advertisement of a pro-Israel event with cockroaches crawling over the image, the New York Post reported.
Shellyne Rodriguez announced her termination in an email to students on January 23 in which she claimed, “Cooper Union has fired me because of a social media post I made about ‘Zionists.'"
She added, "The role of artists in society is to hold up a mirror and SPEAK TRUTH. This is facism. Y'all are learning about it in real-time."
Rodriguez was fired after she shared the offensive image with the cockroaches on Instagram. One of the participants in the pro-Israel event was former Bronx Borough President Rubén Díaz Jr, about whom she wrote, “Look at this dirty f—ing roach former bronx borough president Ruben Diaz Jr. a Zionist lapdog."
Cooper Union Students for Justice in Palestine condemned the decision to fire Rodriguez as “an intense escalation of repression” and called for the decision to be "resisted."
“The Cooper Union wrongfully terminated a valued educator who is indispensable to the community and the academic livelihood of students," SJP claimed, adding that it considers her firing to be part of a campaign to "intimidate and punish" those "who support a free Palestine."
Last month, Rodriguez participated in a CUNY for Palestine panel where it has been alleged she engaged in antisemitic tropes.
CUNY law professor and co-founder of Students and Faculty for Equality at CUNY, Jeffrey Lax, said that “Jewish students at Cooper Union are very relieved that they fired her," but questioned why the university hired her in the first place given her past.
This is not the first time Rodriguez has courted controversy. In May 2023, she threatened a New York Post reporter with a machete when the reporter attempted to speak with her about the time she cursed at anti-abortion students.
When veteran reporter Reuven Fenton knocked on her door, Rodriguez opened the door and warned him to “get the f–k away from my door, or I’m gonna chop you up with this machete!"
She then reappeared with the blade and held it to his neck, repeating her profanity-laden demand that he leave. She continued to follow Fenton after he left the building, yelling, “If I see you on this block one more f–king time, you’re gonna..."
The threat with the machete resulted in Rodriguez being fired from her previous teaching job at Hunter College. She was subsequently hired by Cooper Union.
In late October, Jewish students at Cooper Union were forced to lock themselves inside the library on Wednesday as a mob of anti-Israeli protesters blocked the doors.
Footage posted on social media showed the students in the library as a large crowd of anti-Israeli protesters bang on the doors.
About 40 minutes later, security escorted the students out of the building via a tunnel.