Jewish students share harrowing stories of campus antisemitism as they beg Congress to hold universities accountable
Jewish students implored lawmakers in a Thursday hearing on Capitol Hill to hold more universities accountable for enabling an alarming uptick in antisemitism — with one participant revealing he contacted administrators of 40 separate instances but heard nothing back.
Nine undergraduates from elite US colleges shared harrowing personal stories of harassment, intimidation and assault amid widespread antisemitic demonstrations on campus — and ripped administrators for still ignoring the outpouring of hate nearly five months after Hamas’ Oct. 7 terror attack against Israel.
Harvard Divinity School student Alexander “Shabbos” Kestenbaum told members of the House Education and Workforce Committee at a bipartisan roundtable that he has written to his university’s antisemitism task force more than 40 times regarding discrimination.
He has yet to receive a response — despite lodging one complaint last month against a Harvard employee who challenged him to a debate in a secluded area over the question of “whether Jews orchestrated 9/11,” an incident previously reported by the Jewish News Syndicate.
“That same Harvard employee posted a video on his social media with a machete and a picture of my face saying he wants to fight and has a plan,” Kestenbaum recounted. “For three days I had private armed security outside my house. I had armed security follow me to Shabbat prayer services for my own protection.”
“While I immediately flagged this issue to Harvard and to the police, this individual is still employed by Harvard,” he said. “This is the reality of being a Jew at Harvard in 2024.”
Rep. Kathy Manning (D-NC), a Harvard alumna and co-chair of the House Bipartisan Task Force for Combating Antisemitism, said the student testimonies were “incredibly horrifying.”
“I cannot help but wonder: Is this 1932 Germany all over again? Is this russia in 1903, when my grandparents fled the deadly pogroms and came to this country seeking refuge from antisemites?” Manning asked.
“Every one of us in Congress should be asking ourselves: How did we get here, and what can we do to stop this?”
Other students shared instances of being spit upon, maligned as “dirty Jews,” “colonizers” or “murderers” and facing down antisemitic mobs — that sometimes included their own professors — chanting “resistance is justified” and “globalize the Intifada,” a phrase widely understood as a call for the genocide of Jews.
“Stunning, astonishing, awesome, jubilant, achievement: These are the words that a professor at my university used to describe the deadliest massacre of Jewish people since the Holocaust,” said Eden Yadegar, a junior at Columbia University.
Yadegar, a Middle East Studies major, added that she was now unable to complete coursework for her major because the only course offered on Israel is being taught by this professor.
Joe J. Gindi, a sophomore at Rutgers University, testified that a program coordinator employed by his school screamed at Jewish students at a campus rally in the fall: “F–k you! F–k you, colonizer! F–k you, Zionists!”
“The actions of these staff members effectively denied Jewish students equal access to campus resources, and many students like myself do not feel safe reaching out for help,” Gindi said.
Cooper Union student Jacob Khalili — one of a dozen Jewish students who barricaded themselves in a campus library last October to protect themselves from an antisemitic demonstration — told the roundtable his school had “taken no disciplinary action” since and that the police never put a stop to it.
“I was shocked and horrified to learn that President [Laura] Sparks had been offered, yet refused, police intervention, and then at some point, she had ducked out a back entrance to avoid the demonstrators,” Khalili said.
“I’ve been told over and over again that the university is taking these issues seriously, but always no action,” said Noah Rubin, a University of Pennsylvania student, noting that there were serious warning signs even before Oct. 7.
“In September, I met with public safety to plead they do more to protect Jewish students,” he shared. “I was told that Hillel, the Jewish cultural center, was one of the safest buildings on our campus.”
“Just two days later, Hillel was broken into and vandalized by a perpetrator who was yelling ‘fuck the Jews!’ Two months later, a bomb threat was received, and now I find myself looking over my shoulder, even in Hillel.”
Even after a high-profile hearing with the presidents of Harvard, UPenn and MIT led to resignations from two university leaders, Education and Workforce chairwoman Virginia Foxx (R-NC) said the schools “are still not correcting course.”
“Let me be clear, this is not about policing speech, or opinions, even if disagreeable or offensive,” Foxx said in her opening remarks. “It is about protecting Jewish students from the harassment, threats, intimidation and assaults plaguing the campuses.”
Kestenbaum and others have already filed lawsuits against their universities for selectively enforcing codes of conduct that should prohibit antisemitic behavior — but insisted the panel should continue to subpoena for the truth.
“Harvard has a strong track record of disciplining speech that they do not like,” Kestenbaum said. “The only single exception is Jews.”
“You will be horrified to see what is going on behind the scenes,” he told Manning. “Why is it, as you mentioned, that Harvard so willingly and enthusiastically accepts tens of millions of dollars every year from anti-Western, anti-democratic, antisemitic countries? Where is that money going?”
Some students on the panel also suggested pulling federal funding from their schools until administrators comply with those policies.
“Now is the time to act to make sure federal dollars are not being used to spread hate and discourage Jewish academics,” MIT graduate student Talia Khan said.
But Democrats on the panel favored reforms being made through the US Department of Education, arguing that withholding funding from schools would “punish” all students for the wrongdoing of some.
Bronx Rep. Ritchie Torres (D) told The Post after the roundtable concluded that he is pushing for the creation of third-party monitors over each institution, appointed through the Education Department.
“I think it has become indisputable that these institutions are systemically antisemitic,” Torres said. “They cannot be trusted to police themselves.”
