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US Congress Demands Document Dump From Columbia University as Antisemitism Investigations Continue
Pro-Hamas protesters demonstrating at Columbia University on April 19, 2024. Photo: Melissa Bender via Reuters Connect
Columbia University must hand over disciplinary records to the US House Committee on Education and the Workforce to prove that it is keeping multiple pledges to punish perpetrators of antisemitic discrimination, the new committee chairman, Rep. Tim Walberg (R-MI), wrote to the school on Thursday.
“One only has to review the past letters this committee has sent to the university and the reports issued by both this committee and the House of Representatives to see that Columbia has failed to uphold its commitments, both because the disciplinary process has failed and because the campus administration has refused to enforce its preexisting rules,” Walberg wrote. “Columbia’s continued failure to address the pervasive antisemitism that persists on campus is untenable, particularly given that the university receives billions in federal funding.”
Walberg went on to list a series of alleged antisemitic incidents which fostered the committee’s suspicion that Columbia is being dishonest with Congress, Jewish students, and the public. Shortly after interim Columbia president Katrina Armstrong took office in September, he said, Columbia’s faculty Senate ensured that an anti-Zionist group’s disruption of a course taught by former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton with bullhorns would not be classified as an antisemitic incident and go unpunished; the university’s main anti-Zionist group, Columbia University Apartheid Divest (CUAD), has planned and carried out acts of property destruction while continuing to distribute antisemitic imagery at its rallies; and, in December, someone assaulted a Jewish student and stole his Israeli flag near a CUAD rally, continuing a pattern of violence which began during the 2023-2024 academic year.
The university has seen other disturbing events this academic year, as previously reported by The Algemeiner, though it has levied disciplinary sanctions to those who have been identified and vowed to do so against those who remain at large. Last month, for example, it banned from its campus multiple masked individuals who disrupted an active class and proceeded to utter pro-Hamas statements while distributing antisemitic literature. Later, it denounced a group of students who poured concrete into toilets located inside its School of International Affairs as “deplorable,” adding that it is “acting swiftly to address this misconduct.”
However, Columbia has a history of amnestying violent and destructive anti-Israel protesters. In August, an education committee report revealed that only a few students who were involved in occupying the Hamilton Hall administrative building in April 2024 were ultimately punished despite the university’s threatening to expel them.
“The failure of Columbia’s invertebrate administration to hold accountable students who violate university rules and break the law is disgraceful and unacceptable,” former education committee chair Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-NC) said at the time in a blistering statement. “More than three months after the criminal takeover of Hamilton Hall, the vast majority of the student perpetrators remain in good standing. By allowing its own disciplinary process to be thwarted by radical students and faculty, Columbia has waved the white flag in surrender while offering up a get-out-of-jail-free card to those who participated in these unlawful actions.”
Today, Columbia must operate in a new political and legal landscape, as the re-election of US President Donald Trump to a rare, nonconsecutive second term in office brought to Washington, DC a chief executive who has vowed not only to purge antisemitism from American schools but also to go as far as taxing the endowments of colleges and universities which refuse to aid the effort. So far, Columbia has remained high on the list of the Trump administration’s priorities, and earlier this month it announced that the university is one of five higher education institutions which will be subjected to an exhaustive investigation of antisemitism that will be led by the Department of Education’s (DOE) Office for Civil Rights (OCR).
In Thursday’s letter, Walberg stressed that Washington will accept nothing less than complete accountability and disclosure. To that end, he has requested that “complete case files” for nearly a dozen alleged antisemitic and pro-Hamas incidents on the campus be submitted to the committee “no later than” noon, Feb. 27.
“The fact that Columbia has allowed these activities to continue to take place on campus is of deep concern to the committee,” he concluded. “Unfortunately, Columbia’s trustees, interim president, and deans have not met their promises or commitments. Their negligence has created a hostile environment for members of Columbia’s Jewish communities and resulted in severe disruptions to the university’s learning environment.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post US Congress Demands Document Dump From Columbia University as Antisemitism Investigations Continue first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Security Warning to Israelis Vacationing Abroad Ahead of holidays
A passenger arrives to a terminal at Ben Gurion international airport before Israel bans international flights, January 25, 2021. REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
i24 News – Ahead of the Jewish High Holidays, Israel’s National Security Council (NSC) published the latest threat assessment to Israelis abroad from terrorist groups to the public on Sunday, in order to increase the Israeli public’s awareness of the existing terrorist threats around the world and encourage individuals to take preventive action accordingly.
The NSC specified that the warning is an up-to-date reflection of the main trends in the activities of terrorist groups around the world and their impact on the level of threat posed to Israelis abroad during these times, but the travel warnings and restrictions themselves are not new.
“As the Gaza war continues and in parallel with the increasing threat of terrorism, the National Security Headquarters stated it has recognized a trend of worsening and increasing violent antisemitic incidents and escalating steps by anti-Israel groups, to the point of physically harming Israelis and Jews abroad. This is in light of, among other things, the anti-Israel narrative and the negative media campaign by pro-Palestinian elements — a trend that may encourage and motivate extremist elements to carry out terrorist activities against Israelis or Jews abroad,” the statement read.
“Therefore, the National Security Bureau is reinforcing its recommendation to the Israeli public to act with responsibility during this time when traveling abroad, to check the status of the National Security Bureau’s travel warnings (before purchasing tickets to the destination,) and to act in accordance with the travel warning recommendations and the level of risk in the country they are visiting,” it listed, adding that, as illustrated in the past year, these warnings are well-founded and reflect a tangible and valid threat potential.
The statement also emphasized the risk of sharing content on social media networks indicating current or past service in the Israeli security forces, as these posts increase the risk of being marked by various parties as a target. “Therefore, the National Security Council recommends that you do not upload to social networks, in any way, content that indicates service in the security forces, operational activity, or similar content, as well as real-time locations.”
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Israel Intensifies Gaza City Bombing as Rubio Arrives
Displaced Palestinians, fleeing northern Gaza due to an Israeli military operation, move southward after Israeli forces ordered residents of Gaza City to evacuate to the south, in the central Gaza Strip September 14, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Israeli forces destroyed at least 30 residential buildings in Gaza City and forced thousands of people from their homes, Palestinian officials said, as US Secretary of State Marco Rubio arrived on Sunday to discuss the future of the conflict.
Israel has said it plans to seize the city, where about a million Palestinians have been sheltering, as part of its declared aim of eliminating the terrorist group Hamas, and has intensified attacks on what it has called Hamas’ last bastion.
The group’s political leadership, which has engaged in on-and-off negotiations on a possible ceasefire and hostage release deal, was targeted by Israel in an airstrike in Doha on Tuesday in an attack that drew widespread condemnation.
Qatar will host an emergency Arab-Islamic summit on Monday to discuss the next moves. Rubio said Washington wanted to talk about how to free the 48 hostages – of whom 20 are believed to be still alive – still held by Hamas in Gaza and rebuild the coastal strip.
“What’s happened, has happened,” he said. “We’re gonna meet with them (the Israeli leadership). We’re gonna talk about what the future holds,” Rubio said before heading to Israel where he will stay until Tuesday.
ABRAHAM ACCORDS AT RISK
He was expected to visit the Western Wall Jewish prayer site in Jerusalem on Sunday with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and hold talks with him during the visit.
US officials described Tuesday’s strike on the territory of a close US ally as a unilateral escalation that did not serve American or Israeli interests. Rubio and US President Donald Trump both met Qatar’s Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani on Friday.
Netanyahu signed an agreement on Thursday to push ahead with a settlement expansion plan that would cut across West Bank land that the Palestinians seek for a state – a move the United Arab Emirates warned would undermine the US-brokered Abraham accords that normalized UAE relations with Israel.
Israel, which blocked all food from entering Gaza for 11 weeks earlier this year, has been allowing more aid into the enclave since late July to prevent further food shortages, though the United Nations says far more is needed.
It says it wants civilians to leave Gaza City before it sends more ground forces in. Tens of thousands of people are estimated to have left but hundreds of thousands remain in the area. Hamas has called on people not to leave.
Israeli army forces have been operating inside at least four eastern suburbs for weeks, turning most of at least three of them into wastelands. It is closing in on the center and the western areas of the territory, where most of the displaced people are taking shelter.
Many are reluctant to leave, saying there is not enough space or safety in the south, where Israel has told them to go to what it has designated as a humanitarian zone.
Some say they cannot afford to leave while others say they were hoping the Arab leaders meeting on Monday in Qatar would pressure Israel to scrap its planned offensive.
“The bombardment intensified everywhere and we took down the tents, more than twenty families, we do not know where to go,” said Musbah Al-Kafarna, displaced in Gaza City.
Israel said it had completed five waves of air strikes on Gaza City over the past week, targeting more than 500 sites, including Hamas reconnaissance and sniper sites, buildings containing tunnel openings and weapons depots.
Local officials, who do not distinguish between militant and civilian casualties, say at least 40 people were killed by Israeli fire across the enclave, a least 28 in Gaza City alone.
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Turkey Warns of Escalation as Israel Expands Strikes Beyond Gaza
Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdogan speaks during a press conference with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis (not seen) at the Presidential Palace in Ankara, Turkey, May 13, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Umit Bektas
i24 News – An Israeli strike targeting Hamas officials in Qatar has sparked unease among several Middle Eastern countries that host leaders of the group, with Turkey among the most alarmed.
Officials in Ankara are increasingly worried about how far Israel might go in pursuing those it holds responsible for the October 7 attacks.
Israel’s prime minister effectively acknowledged that the Qatar operation failed to eliminate the Hamas leadership, while stressing the broader point the strike was meant to make: “They enjoy no immunity,” the government said.
On X, Prime Minister Netanyahu went further, writing that “the elimination of Hamas leaders would put an end to the war.”
A senior Turkish official, speaking on condition of anonymity, summed up Ankara’s reaction: “The attack in Qatar showed that the Israeli government is ready to do anything.”
Legally and diplomatically, Turkey occupies a delicate position. As a NATO member, any military operation or targeted killing on its soil could inflame tensions within the alliance and challenge mutual security commitments.
Analysts caution, however, that Israel could opt for covert measures, operations carried out without public acknowledgement, a prospect that has increased anxiety in governments across the region.
Israeli officials remain defiant. In an interview with Ynet, Minister Ze’ev Elkin said: “As long as we have not stopped them, we will pursue them everywhere in the world and settle our accounts with them.” The episode underscores growing fears that efforts to hunt Hamas figures beyond Gaza could widen regional friction and complicate diplomatic relationships.