Columbia University Jewish Community Remains Resolute With Israel Support as Student Groups Expand New BDS Coalition

The Jewish community at Columbia University in New York has remained resolute in supporting Israel amid strong hostility from much of the faculty and student body, with hundreds of people gathering this week to raise money for Israeli emergency services during the Jewish state’s war with the Hamas terror group.

Over 350 alumni, faculty, parents, and students on Monday night gathered at the Moise Safra Center in Manhattan for a fundraiser organized by Chabad at Columbia University and the school’s Jewish Alumni Association to raise money for a new ambulance for Israel’s emergency response service Magen David Adom.

“Recognizing the difficulties students are facing at Columbia University, a group of dedicated Columbia alumni of the Columbia Jewish Alumni Association wanted to do something to help,” Naomi Drizin, the wife of Chabad Rabbi Yuda Drizin, told The Algemeiner. “The primary objective was to come together in celebration of Jewish life while actively contributing to a positive cause — raising funds for a Magen David Adom ambulance.”

The vehicle, Drizin added, will be named the Columbia Jewish Community Ambulance for Magen David Adom and serve as “a symbol of hope and light.”

One student who spoke to The Algemeiner said the event was important to the school’s Jewish community, which is still mourning the lives lost on Oct. 7, when Hamas terrorists invaded Israel and killed over 1,200 people, mostly civilians, in the deadliest single-day massacre of Jews since the Holocaust.

Organized in just three weeks, the student described the event as a triumph.

The fundraiser came days after the Columbia University Apartheid Divest (CUAD) coalition issued a Nov. 14 statement in the campus newspaper demanding the school “immediately divest all economic and academic stakes in Israel” in order to fight “Israeli apartheid” against Palestinians. The coalition falsely accused Israel of “actively committing genocide and ethnic cleansing” and called on Columbia to cancel the opening of its Tel Aviv Global Center and end a dual degree-program the school offers in partnership with Tel Aviv University.

The statement, which was was signed by dozens of campus organizations, argued that Israel’s defensive war in Gaza in response to the Oct. 7 massacre, in which Hamas terrorists also kidnapped hundreds of people from Israel as hostages, was part of an effort to “annex and ethnically cleanse” Palestinian land.

“The Zionist project is reaching its apex as Israel continues to violate international law by indiscriminately bombing civilians and cutting off their access to food, water, medicine, and fuel,” the statement read. “These attacks are explicitly connected to Israel’s attempt to annex and ethnically cleanse more Palestinian land of its indigenous population. As such, it is imperative that we act now. If we wait, there may not be a Gaza left to defend.”

The statement did not mention the Hamas atrocities or that Israel withdraw all its soldiers and civilian settlers from Gaza in 2005.

CUAD supports the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement, which seeks to isolate Israel from the international community as a step toward the Jewish state’s eventual elimination.

Columbia’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) tweeted on Tuesday that the coalition has grown.

“Excited to announce we have officially hit 80 student organizations in our coalition in just one week!” the group wrote. “Columbia students, please mobilize your organizations to join our coalition! We are showing Columbia that the students refuse to be complicit in apartheid and genocide.”

Columbia announced earlier this month that it had suspended SJP and Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), another anti-Israel group, as official student organizations on campus through the end of the fall semester.

“This decision was made after the two groups repeatedly violated university policies related to holding campus events, culminating in an unauthorized event Thursday afternoon that proceeded despite warnings and included threatening rhetoric and intimidation,” said Gerald Rosberg, senior executive vice president of the university who also chairs Columbia’s Special Committee on Campus Safety.

Hundreds of students walked out of class at Columbia that Thursday, demanding an immediate ceasefire to the fighting in Gaza, for school officials to falsely call Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians a “genocide,” and for the university to boycott and divest from Israeli institutions. The protesters did not mention Hamas or demand the release of the hostages still being held in Gaza.

The prior day, dozens of students from Columbia’s School of Social Work staged an over nine-hour sit-in, claiming they were expressing solidarity with local and national Palestinian resistance movements — a stunt that school officials said violated rules in the university’s code of conduct.

Both SJP and JVP have been instrumental in organizing anti-Israel protests on Columbia’s campus since Hamas’ onslaught across southern Israel last month.

“Lifting the suspension will be contingent on the two groups demonstrating a commitment to compliance with university policies and engaging in consultations at a group leadership level with university officials,” said Rosberg, who added that the suspension means the two groups will not be eligible to hold events on campus or receive university funding.

The suspension has not deterred anti-Israel groups at Columbia from holding protests in solidarity with SJP, which appears to be still organizing events with other campus organizations despite its suspension.

In its Nov. 14 statement, CUAD said it was “moved to action by the ostensibly politically motivated suspension” of SJP and JVP, demanding Columbia reinstate both groups and “issue an official apology for their unjust suspension in violation of university procedure.” SJP and JVP were the first two signatories of the statement.

Columbia has come under intense scrutiny for its response to Hamas’ Oct. 7 pogrom and the resultant war between Israel and the Palestinian terror group. Several students and professors have released multiple letters seemingly blaming Israel for the current conflict and rationalizing the Hamas atrocities.

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.

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