NYU student, criticized and lost job offer for Israel-Hamas remarks, speaks out

A New York University Law School student whose job offer from an international law firm was rescinded for remarks seen as insensitive to victims of the Hamas attack on Israel said they would continue to speak out.

Ryna Workman, who uses the pronouns they/them, told ABC News that speaking out was a matter of human rights.

"I will continue to speak up for Palestinian human rights and use whatever platform I have available to me to call for a ceasefire and end this occupation that's harming the Palestinians," Workman told ABC News Live Prime anchor Linsey Davis Tuesday in an exclusive interview.

Workman sent an email to their classmates on Oct. 10 supporting the Palestinian people and condemning Israel.

"This week, I want to express, first and foremost, my unwavering and absolute solidarity with Palestinians in their resistance against oppression toward liberation and self-determination," Workman wrote in their statement. "Israel bears full responsibility for this tremendous loss of life. This regime of state-sanctioned violence created the conditions that made resistance necessary."

After Workman sent their message, members of the NYU community quickly denounced them for blaming the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas on Israel and not the attackers who are labeled a terrorist group by the United States Director of National Intelligence.

"Acts of terrorism are immoral," NYU's spokesperson said in a statement to ABC News. "The indiscriminate killing of civilians and hostage-taking, including children and the elderly, is reprehensible. Blaming victims of terrorism for their own deaths is wrong."

Workman was asked several times if they would change anything about their original statement or if they condemned the attack by Hamas. Workman stuck with their talking points.

"I think what I use my platform for, and who I condemn was pretty clear by my message," Workman said. "I think I will continue to condemn apartheid and military occupation."

Soon after Workman's original statement, their job offer with the law firm Winston & Strawn was rescinded and their position as Student Bar Association President at NYU was removed. The law firm and NYU sent ABC News statements citing Workman's message as the reason for their withdrawal.

"While those consequences were devastating for me, I think that at that moment, and continuously, I'm still focused on the devastation that's happening in Gaza right now," Workman told ABC News.

Other pro-Palestinian students in colleges and universities around the country have suffered the repercussions for what critics call a lack of empathy for those affected by the Hamas attack.

After multiple student groups at Harvard University released a statement saying Israel was "entirely responsible for all unfolding violence," billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman and other CEOs reportedly called for the release of the names of students within those organizations so they could avoid hiring them. A doxxing truck drove near the campus revealing the names and pictures of the group's leaders and labelling them antisemitic.

At the University of Pennsylvania, multiple major financial backers of the school sent statements to ABC News withdrawing their support because of a Palestinian festival, which allegedly included speakers with histories of making antisemitic remarks. The festival was held a couple of weeks before the Hamas attack that boiled over tensions on campus that were already simmering.

"This targeting of students that's happening is a really strong suppression campaign, and it's hurting students and only the students who are actively being targeted for saying things or being in solidarity with Palestine," Workman told ABC News. "It does a lot of harm to higher education when students who come to these universities into these institutions to find their voice are now being told that certain things that they say will not be acceptable."

Workman posted on social media that they will participate in a national student walkout on Wednesday for the end of the siege on Gaza by Israel. Multiple groups around the country have also participated in protests for the victims in Gaza.

"I think this walkout is an opportunity for students to find their voice again," Workman said. "And to feel the collective power that their voice has when they walk out not only with the students at their institution like we'll be doing at NYU, but with students across the country."

ABC News' Armando Garcia and Victoria Moll Ramirez contributed to this report.