Columbia University SUSPENDED student groups for Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace after staging protests that ‘threatened and intimidated’ students

Columbia University in New York City has suspended student groups Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) after unauthorized campus protests left students feeling threatened and intimidated.

The two student organizations have been suspended as official student groups until the end of the fall semester.

Columbia’s senior executive vice president and chairman of the Special Committee on Campus Safety Gerald Rosberg announced the news in a statement Friday afternoon.

“This decision was made after the two groups repeatedly violated university policy regarding the holding of campus events, culminating in an unauthorized event Thursday afternoon that went ahead despite warnings and included threatening rhetoric and intimidation,” said Rosberg, who is also president of Columbia’s Special Committee. about campus safety.

Columbia SJP said in a post on X, formerly Twitter, on Friday that followers should “stay tuned for an official response.”

Days after Hamas’s attacks, Columbia’s Students for Justice in Palestine said Hamas’ actions were a “counteroffensive against their settler-colonial oppressor.”

SJP is a network of pro-Palestinian student groups in the US that spread anti-Israel propaganda, often mixed with anti-emetic, provocative and sometimes violent messages.

Immediately following the brutal October 7 massacre in which Hamas slaughtered 1,400 innocent civilians – including women, children and the elderly – many SJP branches released statements of support, including footage of the attacks, and applauded the rape and murder as Palestinian ‘resistance’ to Israel. .

JVP is an anti-Zionist group that supports the international boycott movement against Israel.

Suspension means the two student groups will not be eligible to host on-campus events or receive university funding until the end of the semester.

It is unclear whether the groups will return to campus next semester.

Brandeis last week became the first private university to ban Students for Justice in Palestine on campus.

The Anti-Defamation League last month issued an “urgent” open letter urging college and university administrators to “immediately investigate” their campus chapters of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) for “possible violations of the prohibition on materially supporting a foreign terrorist organization’. .’

Just last week, Columbia University launched an anti-Semitism task force to tackle the “terribly resilient form of hate” after a record number of Jewish-related attacks and harassment on campus.

A Jewish billionaire has resigned from the Columbia Business School board over the Ivy League’s acceptance of “blatantly anti-Jewish student groups.”

Philanthropist Henry Swieca, 66, sent his alma matter a letter on Oct. 30 explaining that he was resigning from the board because he needed to “take a principled stand” after student protests during the war between Israel and Hamas.

In the letter, he wrote, “Now that blatantly anti-Jewish student groups and professors are allowed to operate with complete impunity, a clear and disturbing message is being sent that Jews are not only unwelcome, but unsafe on campus.