‘Subset of Jewish People’: Columbia University Student Who Called for Death of Zionists Files Lawsuit Against School

Columbia University is being sued for discrimination by a student it suspended for filming himself proclaim that Zionists should be murdered and are fortunate that he has not begun killing them himself.

The student, Khymani James, has alleged that the suspension — prompted by the incident and other misconduct charges Columbia filed against him for participating in an illegal pro-Hamas encampment — was racist and aimed at “privileging a subset of Jewish people.”

At the time, James’ denigration of Jews received national media coverage and reinforced a perception that anti-Zionist protesters at Columbia University have been motivated by antisemitism. His lawyers said that negative publicity and racial animus, rather than any clear violation of school rules, caused administrators to levy the suspension, noting that it came nearly five months after the precipitating incident.

“First, James as a person of color is squarely within a protected class of black and brown-skinned students who have been the major targets of Columbia’s disciplinary actions arising from pro-Palestinian expression,” said a copy of the suit obtained by The Algemeiner. “Secondly, James has been a victim of Columbia’s anti-Palestinian bias, severely punished, though not himself a Palestinian, as a supporter of the rights of Palestinian people. Third, James has been a victim of reverse discrimination, as Columbia privileges a class of self-described ‘Zionist Jewish’ people over everyone on campus who does not share their views.”

The suit charged twice that Columbia University favored Jews over “nonJews” [sic], continuing James’ pattern of promoting antisemitic tropes, and portrayed him as a victim.

It continued, “The environment at Columbia, which has been rendered hostile for James, is sufficiently severe, pervasive, persistent, and offensive such that it deprives James of equal access to the opportunities and benefits that Columbia provides to other students.”

Earlier this week, James tied the announcement of the lawsuit to a series of bizarre tweets in which he discussed being criticized for “nine month old tea” and accused Columbia of “cowering to billionaire donors and fascists politicians.” In another post, he was photographed riding a water ski and making an obscene hand gesture.

Columbia University, which has declined to publicly comment on James’ suit, has been sued several times within the last year, the consequence of actions it did and did not take during an explosion of antisemitic protests on the campus that followed Hamas’ Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel.

In June, it settled a lawsuit in which it was accused by a student of neglecting its obligation to foster a safe learning environment amid riotous pro-Hamas protests that were held at the school throughout the final weeks of the academic year.

The resolution of the case, first reported by Reuters, required that Columbia hire a “Safe Passage Liaison” to monitor protests and “walking escorts” who will accompany Jewish students whose safety is threatened around the campus. Other details of the settlement included “accommodations” for students whose academic lives are disrupted by protests and new security policies for controlling access to school property.

Filed in April, when anti-Zionist students first erected and began living in a pro-Hamas encampment on the campus’ South Lawn, the complaint painted a damning portrait of Columbia’s handling of a situation that quickly set off a conflagration in which Jewish students were physically and verbally assaulted, outsiders infiltrated the campus, and protesters cheered terrorism while destroying school property.

Another suit, filed in the US District Court of Southern New York in February by the StandWithUs Center for Legal Justice (SCLJ), alleged that administrators stood b y while Jewish students endured various forms of abuse after Oct. 7.

“F—k the Jews,” “Death to Jews,” “Jews will not defeat us,” and “From water to water, Palestine will be Arab” were among the chants shouted by students on campus grounds after the tragedy, violating the school’s code of conduct and never facing consequences, the complaint said. Faculty engaged in similar behavior. On Oct. 8, professor Joseph Massad published in Electronic Intifada an essay cheering Hamas’ atrocities, which included slaughtering children and raping women, as “awesome” and describing men who paraglided into a music festival to kill young people as “the air force of the Palestinian resistance.”

The complaint went on to allege that after bullying Jewish students and rubbing their noses in the carnage Hamas wrought on their people, pro-Hamas students were still unsatisfied and resulted to violence. They beat up five Jewish students in Columbia’s Butler Library. Another attacked a Jewish students with a stick, lacerating his head and breaking his finger, after being asked to return missing persons posters she had stolen.

The New York branch of the American Civil Liberties Union is also suing Columbia University because it suspended an anti-Zionist student group, Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), whose members allegedly perpetrated numerous antisemitic incidents reported by Jewish students. Filed in March, it described the members of SJP, an organization linked to Islamist terrorist organizations, as peaceful advocates of social justice.

“These student groups were peacefully speaking out on a critical global conflict, only to have Columbia University ignore their own longstanding, existing rules and abruptly suspend the organizations,” Donna Lieberman, executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, said in a statement announcing the action. “That’s retaliatory, it’s targeted, and it flies in the face of the free speech principles that institutes of higher learning should be defending.”

The succession of scandals, litigation, and congressional investigations led to the resignation of president Minouche Shafik, who directly cited the post-Oct. 7 campus environment as her reason for leaving office.

“This period has taken a considerable toll on my family, as it has for others in our community,” Shafik said in a statement issued just days away from the beginning of fall term. “Over the summer, I have been able to reflect and have decided that my moving on at this point would best enable Columbia to traverse the challenges ahead. I am making this announcement now so that new leadership can be in place before the new terms begins.”

On Tuesday, a Jewish civil rights advocacy group, Documenting Jewish Hatred on Campus at Columbia U (DJH), told The Algemeiner that this latest suit “has no merit.”

“Khymani James was disciplined for repeatedly violating multiple Columbia University Rules of Conduct,” it said.

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.

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