Today, I have sent in an op-ed submission to the Columbia Spectator, campus newspaper of Columbia University. It is in response to an August 5, 2025 op-ed by Nawal K. Maalouf, a Columbia Law School graduate, in which she complains about Columbia's steps to deal with long-standing complaints of anti-Semitism on campus. Whether or not the Spectator will publish the letter is unknown. In the meantime, I am posting it here.
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I would like to offer a response to the August 5, 2025 op-ed by Nawal K. Maalouf entitled, "Columbia's fight against anti-Semitism should not come at the expense of free speech or Muslim students."
While I have no first-hand experience at Columbia, I do have first-hand experience teaching part-time at the University of California at Irvine, Extension from 1998-2016. As a gentile, I personally witnessed how legitimate speech criticizing Israel all too often crossed the line into anti-Jewish speech. I have attended many pro-Palestinian events where speakers have insulted Jews as people and called for the total destruction of Israel. I have seen how Jewish students on campus have been bullied, intimidated, assaulted, and had their own events repeatedly disrupted by Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and/or its allies, disruptions I personally witnessed.
In addition, I have also seen how the UC Irvine administration and virtually all the other UC campuses have ignored the concerns and fears of their Jewish students and allowed pro-Palestinian protests to ride roughshod over the campus. UC Irvine also had its own encampment in 2024, which had to finally be dismantled by the police, and rightfully so.
As one who has followed the growing anti-Semitism on our college campuses with dismay and disgust, I have also noted how Columbia grew into arguably the worst among US universities with a hostile learning environment for Jewish students. Even before the barbaric Hamas attack against Israel on October 7, 2023, Columbia's reputation for anti-Semitism had been sinking lower and lower for years due to a series of ugly incidents inspired by anti-Israel activism.
Since October 7, 2023, the pro-Palestinian movement can rightfully be called the pro-Hamas movement. For over two decades now, our universities have been the focal point for the US resurgence in anti-Semitism, and now it has metastasized into society at large. Make no mistake, however, since October 7, 2023, it is our universities, led by Columbia, which have again been in the forefront.
Maalouf writes about peaceful protests. Like the occupation of Hamilton Hall in 2024? Does she also think that disrupting pro-Israel speakers is peaceful protest, denying others the right to voice their opinions and the right of their listeners to hear what they have to say? Maalouf is a law school graduate. Did not the Columbia School of Law teach her about the First Amendment? Or does the right of free speech only apply to the pro-Palestinian crowd? I recall several years ago when three leaders of Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) came to speak at UC Irvine and said that Zionists should not be able to feel comfortable on campus and that pro-Israel speech was "useless discourse".
Yes, people have the right to peacefully protest and express their views. What you don't get to do is disrupt the operation of the university. You don't get to take over public space and deny that space to others. You don't get to disrupt speakers and events that you don't agree with. You don't get to intimidate Jewish students and stir up Jew hatred on campus. And if you are a foreign student, you don't get to come to our country and cause disruption to the schools that admit you to study. A student visa is a privilege, not a constitutional right. Whatever country you come here from, you are, in effect, an ambassador for that country. If you act badly, it forms a negative perception of your country
When I attend pro-Palestinian events on the UC Irvine campus or anywhere else, I respect the right of the speaker to express his/her opinion, no matter how much I disagree. I have never disrupted anyone's speech or anyone's event. I follow the protocol and ask my questions or make my statement during the q and or even after that if the speaker hangs around after the event. I have always conducted myself in a manner not to discredit my position as an (adjunct) faculty member, as well as the point of view I was representing.
Maalouf also states that because of her shame over Columbia's (belated) efforts to protect Jewish students, which, according to her, are negatively impacting Muslim students, she has ceased donations to the university. For years now, I have been saying that donors should stop giving their money to universities, but for different reasons. In my mind, no university that fails to protect all its students, including Jewish students, should be given money. It is only through the pocketbook that academia will begin to reform.
In that regard, I also believe that Muslim students should not be targeted for unfair treatment or hatred. There are, after all, Muslims who are not disrupting the operations of their respective schools and who are not engaging in anti-Semitism. But those Muslims, be they students, professors, or outside activists, who are causing disruption, who are targeting Jewish students, should stop and consider to what extent they themselves are contributing to anti-Muslim perceptions.
