Columbia Capitulates

Equity before the law requires more than the future application of the law, but also the prosecution of past violations, particularly when they are of such an obscene degree as has been witnessed in recent memory.  Hence, while capitulation and reform are a welcome sign of Columbia once again supporting the rights of its students, the relative parties must be prosecuted for the crimes which have thus far gone unaddressed.

by Hugh Fitzgerald | Mar 26, 2025

Columbia University has agreed to a series of changes demanded by the Trump administration as a precondition for restoring $400 million in federal funding that earlier this month the government had pulled, amid allegations that the school tolerated antisemitism on campus.

More on Columbia’s capitulation can be found here: “Columbia bans face masks in protests and acquiesces to other Trump administration demands,” by Philissa Cramer, JTA, March 21, 2025:

(JTA) — Columbia University is banning the use of face masks by protesters and hiring dozens of police officers as it seeks to win back federal funding cut by the Trump administration to penalize the school for its pro-Palestinian protests.

Columbia also says it will review its admissions practices, citing “a recent downturn in both Jewish and African American enrollment.” The school had not previously disclosed the downturn, which follows both high-profile anti-Israel protests on campus and a Supreme Court ruling barring universities from weighing race in admissions decisions.

A ban on face masks and changes to admissions had been among the demands laid out last week by the Trump administration for the school to regain $400 million in federal grants, mostly for science research, cut over what it said were threats against Jewish students on Columbia’s campus….

Just in time, Columbia acted to satisfy most — though apparently not all — of the Trump administration’s demands for changes in its policies. It had been given a deadline, then that deadline had been extended, to provide its answer to the list of demands.

Columbia has agreed to hire 36 special police who will have the authority to arrest both students and non-students on campus. The university will also ban the wearing of face masks, which pro-Hamas demonstrators have used to hide their identities. These measures will make it easier to identify malefactors on campus, and to arrest those who engage in proscribed behavior, which this past year included harassing Jewish students and surrounding some who were thus briefly held hostage, disrupting classes taught by Israeli faculty members, and chanting antisemitic slogans calling for the disappearance of the Jewish state and its replacement by a 23rd Arab one — “From the river to the sea/Palestine will be free” and a genocidal threat directed at all Jews — “Intifada Now.”

But by far the most important demand is that concerning how Middle Eastern studies are taught at Columbia. Here the university commits to hiring a vice provost who will now be in charge of the relevant departments, taking away the authority of the professors who have proven to be solidly anti-Israel; their number includes Rashid Khalidi, Hamid Dabashi, and Joseph Massad, all of them deeply committed to the “cause of Palestine.” These three have been an unholy trinity, determined to hire only those who agree with that cause, and share their deep anti-Israel animus. They also make sure that courses on the Middle East present the Palestinians, not the Jews, as the indigenous inhabitants of the Land of Israel, though Jews were living on the land for the past 3500 years, while the first Muslim Arabs arrived in the area only in the seventh century. In their imaginative and sinister versions of history, “the Jews,” who had no historic connection to the land, simply stole it from its real owners, the Arabs, and it is the ferocious Israeli response to the understandable Arab attempt to take back the land that was stolen from them that explains the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Below is the paragraph where Columbia commits to appointing a Senior Vice Provost to take over the direction of Middle East studies, across several academic departments and programs. He or she will review the course offerings, and the substance of each course, for evidence of imbalance; and review the leadership — meaning that such professors as Khalidi, Dabashi, and Massad will be stripped of most of their malign authority to choose new faculty — until now, no pro-Israel scholars needed bother to apply — and of their ability to ensure all courses conform to their one-sided version of Middle Eastern history.

Here is the most important paragraph in Columbia’s letter to the government about the measures it will now take to assure a more balanced coverage of Israel and its Arab enemies:

Appointment of new Senior Vice Provost. As part of our ongoing efforts, we are appointing a new Senior Vice Provost this week with a focus on promoting excellence in Regional Studies. As part of this portfolio, the Senior Vice Provost, acting with the authority of the Provost Office, will conduct a thorough review of the portfolio of programs in regional areas across the University, starting immediately with the Middle East. This review will include the Center for Palestine Studies; the Institute for Israel and Jewish Studies; Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies; the Middle East Institute; the Tel Aviv and Amman global hubs; the School of International and Public Affairs Middle East Policy major; and other University programs focused on the Middle East (together, the “Middle East Programs”). In this role, the Senior Vice Provost will: (1) review the educational programs to ensure the educational offerings are comprehensive and balanced; (2) review all aspects of leadership and curriculum; (3) steward the creation of new programs to address the full range of fields; (4) create a standard review process for the hiring of non-tenured faculty across the University, partnering with the Senior Vice Provost for Academic Affairs and the schools; (5) review the processes for approving curricular changes; (6) following academic procedures, make recommendations to the President and Provost about any necessary changes, academic restructuring, or investments that will ensure academic excellence and complementarity across all programs in the given academic areas.

I wonder what Joseph Massad, Rashid Khalidi, and Hamid Dabashi are now thinking. Their scandalous reign is over. The time when they could bully Jewish students in the classroom, or assign a skewed reading list brimming with ani-Israel bias, or lecture in their classroom about the sheer wonderfulness of Hamas and the monstrousness of the Jewish state, and hire only faculty who, like them, were relentlessly anti-Israel, are now over. Fun while it lasted for these professorial bullies, but for them, the days of wine and roses are definitely over. Now the grownups are being put in charge of Middle East Studies at Columbia. And with the government ready to cut funding again for the university if it fails to deliver on its promises, Columbia is not going to take any chances. It will now hew to the straight and narrow. Its students, and our country, will be the better for it.