There Is No Place For Jews At Columbia University

On June 18, 2025, Columbia University announced that it had produced its third report on antisemitism. One would imagine that it would give people hope that the administration was seriously tackling Jew hatred on campus.

Alas.

The “Task Force On Antisemitism” did not focus on Jew hatred at Columbia; it did a poll of ALL students about how they felt about the anti-Israel encampments on campus during the 2023-2024 school year. The “antisemitism” task force wanted to understand everyone’s feelings. It was as though the Black Lives Matter movement put out a research paper that ALL Lives Matter. Not incorrect, just deaf, dumb and blind to the mission.

The report was called “Student Belonging and Exclusion Survey Report,” and polled 9,000 undergraduate and graduate students at the university in the summer of 2024. The responses were broken down between Jewish, Muslim, Christian, None and Other religious groups.

Jews fared the worst on each question.

Whether the question was about “a sense of belonging at Columbia” where only 34% of Jewish students felt welcome (compared to 41%, 54%, 51% and 49% for each of the other religious categories), or don’t feel accepted because of one’s religion where 62% of Jews felt unwelcome (compared to 53%, 13%, 3% and 11%), Jews were outliers, with Muslims trailing.

Jews were the most likely to have felt discrimination (53% versus 43%, 6%, 1% and 7%) and were uncomfortable sharing their beliefs (87% versus 82%, 64%, 58% and 58%). The fact that the majority of Columbia students were uncomfortable expressing their beliefs – including atheists – is a damning finding about university culture, beyond antisemitism.

Jews lost the most friends because of the encampments and campus environment (29% versus 16%, 7%, 6% and 9%) and had strained relationships (53% versus 30%, 27%, 22% and 20%). That is a sad state that extends to the personal student level, passed the administration and faculty.

And while Jews felt the most stress over the period, they are learning the least. The campus protest barely taught them anything about the regional dynamic. But Christian and other faiths learned a lot – of pro-Palestinian narrative.

How does one know that students have only been absorbing a pro-Palestinian narrative from a year of encampments? While half of the student body participated or supported the protests, virtually none supported Israel. The pro-Israel protests were almost exclusively Jewish. While 21% of Jews sided with the Stateless Arabs from Palestine (SAPs), a mere 1% of Christians, atheists and other faiths supported Israel. No Muslims supported the Jewish State.

Israel is a pariah at Columbia University. It is only supported by a number of Jews.

How can an institution that claims to champion an open exchange of ideas have a majority of students afraid to express their beliefs? How is it that only Jews support Israel on campus?

It is obvious why nearly two-thirds of Jews at Columbia feel unwelcome on campus. It is unclear why any Jew continues to attend.

Banner hung at Columbia University’s Hamilton Hall supporting “intifada,” violence against Jewish civilians

Related:

Columbia University Sets New Standards For Free Speech (December 2024)

Ignoring Columbia’s – And The Education Industry’s – Systemic Antisemitism (July 2024)

Columbia University Completely Fails Mission. And Jews (October 2023)

Is Columbia University Promoting Violence Against Israel and Jews? (December 2019)

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