Columbia ends suspensions of most students disciplined for anti-Israel protests
Almost all students arrested over encampment, break-in and occupation of academic building restored to good standing, university says, after inquiry from US Congress
Most students at Columbia University who faced disciplinary action, suspension or arrest for participating in protests last year calling on the school to cut ties with Israel over its war against the Hamas terror group in Gaza will soon return to campus, information shared by the university shows.
Of the 40 students arrested or disciplined when the university called police to the campus on April 18 on the eve of then-university president Minouche Shafik’s testimony to congress, only two remain suspended, according to information released by a Republican-led US congressional panel.
From the over 80 students arrested between April 29 and May 1, among them some 22 students who were detained after breaking into and occupying the university’s Hamilton Hall building, only three students now face interim suspension without access to the campus, while one more is on disciplinary probation from a prior hearing and 18 are in “good standing,” the information released on Monday showed.
The US House of Representatives’ Education and the Workforce Committee, which is probing allegations of antisemitism on American campuses, asked for this information from the university and was critical of Columbia, saying its actions were insufficient to address a hostile environment for Jewish students.
“The failure of Columbia’s invertebrate administration to hold accountable students who violate university rules and break the law is disgraceful and unacceptable,” said committee chairwoman Virginia Foxx, a Republican from North Carolina, in a statement.
“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.”
“Breaking into campus buildings or creating antisemitic hostile environments like the encampment should never be given a single degree of latitude — the university’s willingness to do just that is reprehensible,” Foxx said.
The protests at Columbia— in particular the encampment set up on a campus lawn and then the forcible entry and occupation of an academic building, were at the forefront of a wave of controversial student activism in the spring at universities across the United States.
The protests, which included expressions of support for Hamas and other terror groups and occasionally crossed into intimidation and violence against Jewish students, called on universities to sever ties with Israel over the war that began on October 7, when thousands of Hamas-led terrorists invaded southern Israel from the Gaza Strip, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages.
The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry says more than 40,000 people in the Strip have been killed or are presumed dead in the fighting so far, though the toll cannot be verified and does not differentiate between civilians and fighters. Israel says it has killed some 17,000 combatants in battle and another 1,000 terrorists inside Israel on October 7.
Israel has said it seeks to minimize civilian fatalities and stresses that Hamas uses Gaza’s civilians as human shields, fighting from civilian areas including homes, hospitals, schools, and mosques.
The information shared by the university showed dozens of disciplinary cases are ongoing. Columbia University Apartheid Divest, a group behind the protests, said those students could still face disciplinary action.
The information released on Monday, which was current up to August 6, also showed Columbia had not charged any protesting students with hate speech, but rather with trespassing, disruptive behavior, participation in unauthorized protests and failure to disperse.
The release of the documents came a few months after New York District Attorney Alvin Bragg dropped criminal charges against most of the students who participated in the break-in and occupation of Hamilton Hall.
At a court hearing in June, Bragg’s office said it would not pursue criminal charges for 31 of the 46 people initially arrested on trespassing charges inside the building, citing a lack of evidence tying them to specific acts of property damage and the fact that none of the students had criminal histories.
Stephen Millan, an assistant district attorney, noted that the protesters wore masks and blocked surveillance cameras in the building, making it difficult to “prove that they participated in damaging any Columbia University property or causing harm to anyone.”
Prosecutors said they would move forward with charges against one person involved in the building occupation, who is also accused of breaking an NYPD camera in a holding cell. Thirteen others arrested in the building were offered deals that would have eventually led to the dismissal of their charges, but they refused them.
The release of the documents also came less than a week after the school’s president Shafik resigned in advance of the new academic year after only about a year in the role. She was the fourth Ivy League president to step down in the wake of campus controversies tied to October 7, representing half of the eight schools in the elite conference.
Columbia is set to return to classes on September 3, and has already closed its main campus to members of the public until further notice, girding for potential protest activity as the war in Gaza continues. The university’s Barnard College has already seen protests, with a small group picketing the women’s school as students began moving in earlier this week.
