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The situation unfolding across college campuses in the United States is a complicated one, and bears reflection. I do not propose anything definitive, but I wanted to share a few thoughts. A Very Brief History of the University: The first question we must ask is “What are universities even for?” It is not an easy one. They began as institutions to train clerics in theology and philosophy, and evolved gradually into places for training gentleman scholars. Oxford and Cambridge in the 19th century did not live up to the model St. John Henry Newman describes in The Idea of a...

When you let a crazed, genocidal maniac talk long enough, they will always expose themselves. That happened on Thursday when two videos were released of a pro-Hamas protest leader suggesting Jews should be murdered. Shockingly, this is the same person Columbia University officials have been "negotiating" with over the last few days. Kymani James can be seen ranting about how "Zionists," which are Jews, do not deserve to live and should be exterminated like "nazis." A fair warning. This guy's words are extremely violent and disturbing.One of the Columbia students leading the “protest” posted this video stating that “Zionists do...

Mike Rowe gets it. And he always has. Unlike far too many Americans, he understands the value of hard work and why more of us (especially young people getting ready to go to college or already in college) need to do more of it. Especially right now as we're watching schools like Columbia, Yale, Barnard, and others eating themselves with the pro-Palestine/Hamas riots. Protests. Whatever. They say tomato ... they're wrong. Take a look at this from Rowe: For a guy who runs a foundation that sends young people to trade schools all over America – trade schools where I’m...

RAFAH — Hamas has issued a statement of thanks to American university students for their unwavering support over the past few weeks, promising that, in return, the deaths of university students in the coming global intifada would be relatively quick and painless. "Our cold hearts have been warmed by the unquestioning loyalty of American college students," said Hamas spokesman Muhammed Muhammed Al-Muhammed Muhammed to reporters. "As a token of our gratitude, we will shoot you and blow you up instead of cutting your heads off while raping you when we globalize our glorious intifada and cleanse the world of all...

The same Columbia University professor who advocated defunding the police is the same professor who is now pleading for law enforcement to protect him from the anti-Israel protestors invading the university’s campus. Columbia Business School assistant professor Shai Davidai was a staunch anti-police advocate in the past, accusing law enforcement of using their weapons “disproportionately on black men.” “Lawmakers give police offers the ammunition which they then use disproportionately on Black men. Should we hold lawmakers accountable?” Davidai said when asked by author and filmmaker Mike Cernovich if he is “worried that the evil racist police will shoot people?” Aren’t...

Pro-Hamas protestors, not all of whom are students, have creating a living nightmare for Columbia University's students and the working element of its faculty and administration. Jewish students have been targeted and threatened. University pathways have been blocked. Smelly tent cities not up to anyone's code have gone up. Trash is visible. The university lawn has been trampled. Classes have moved to Zoom for the remainder of the semester, making Columbia the world's priciest online school. And yes, there is a public relations price for the school to pay for this mayhem, the school's name stinks. Students who go to...

A Columbia University professor is speaking out against anti-Israel protestors and calling on police to protect him. The professor, however, has a history of anti-police activism. On Monday, Columbia Business School assistant professor Shai Davidai, who is Jewish, attempted to lead counter-protestors against an anti-Israel demonstration known as a “Gaza Solidarity Encampment,” but was denied access to campus after his ID was deactivated, according to a report by Columbia Daily Spectator. As Breitbart News reported, the professor was also denied access to the university’s main campus on Friday, ostensibly for his own safety from an anti-Israel mob.

Happy Passover, the holiday when American Jews attempt to pass over an Ivy League campus and British Jews attempt to pass over a Central London thoroughfare. Surveying the scene at Columbia, Powerline's Scott Johnson posts a picture of Nazis preventing Jews from entering the University of Vienna in 1938. We are enjoined not to go full Godwin's this early in the column, but the photograph prompted this thought: A century ago, the Jews of Germany were the most assimilated in Europe. They had prospered under the Kaiser, and seemed set to do even better in the Weimar Republic. They were...

The recent wave of violent protests and arrests at elite universities like Yale and Columbia have only confirmed for Scott Katz that he made the right decision to attend Elon University. The North Carolina college, where he is currently wrapping up his sophomore year, is a long way from his hometown of Lafayette Hill, the predominantly liberal Philadelphia suburb where the average home costs $610,000. Katz, who is Jewish, says the antisemitism that’s increasingly visible at colleges nationwide—especially in the Ivy League, and other elite institutions like Stanford and Berkeley—hasn’t even touched his campus. “I haven’t been affected by it...

Aidan Parisi pledged to 'resist' and called for 'intifada' after Columbia ordered him to vacate his on-campus apartment.. For more than two weeks, Columbia University graduate student Aidan Parisi has defied the university’s suspension, refusing to vacate his dorm room on the school's Manhattan campus. The school announced Parisi’s suspension on April 4 following his participation in a pro-Hamas event. And while Columbia leaders have pledged to enforce the suspension, they have yet to follow through. In the meantime, Parisi has contributed to the mayhem that has engulfed the campus over the past several days, serving as a leader of...

As Columbia University President Dr. Nemat "Minouche" Shafik faces scrutiny from ongoing campus protests over Israel’s war with Hamas, a more than 20-year-old video is getting renewed attention for remarks on the causes of terrorism. The video, filmed just two months after 9/11, shows Shafik – who was then vice president at the World Bank – discussing the economic roots of terrorism with UC Berkeley’s Harry Kreisler on the program, "Conversations with History." Shafik argued that although terrorism has sprung up in "fairly rich and open societies," its most fertile ground is in countries beset by "economic stagnation and political...

Nothing an American college student espouses today, would have more than a 24-hour shelf life, in any major Muslim country on the planet – this is the rule. A few conservative and Christian schools may be an exception to the rule, but most liberal Ivy League and graduate schools would come under the rule, in fact they are what prove the rule.

The director Alex Garland couldn’t have asked for better real-world headlines to accompany the release of Civil War, his new dystopian picture of a United States plunged into civil conflict by the inability of Americans to overcome partisan differences. In recent days, that spirit of irreconcilable enmity has seemingly swept America’s elite campuses, with pro-Palestinian students camping out on the quad in defiance of local authorities—and lawmakers in Washington who long ago cashiered law-making for the important work of skewering university administrators in front of cable-news cameras. The student protest might appear ferocious, and it is, at times, downright ugly....

Dozens have been arrested at NYU and Yale, and Columbia cancels in-person classes as discord over the war in Gaza grows among students across the country.The president of Columbia University announced a midnight deadline for students and others to reach an agreement about dismantling an encampment on campus set up in protest. The encampment was set up four days ago on the Manhattan campus’ West Lawn. On Thursday, police made more than 100 arrests when they were called in about an encampment on the South Lawn, and for which Columbia was criticized. Columbia University President Minouche Shafik said in a...

Columbia students are sustaining themselves with pricey $12 croissants, organic grain granola and a variety of vegan and gluten-free homemade goods at the pro-Palestine protest encampment on the university's iconic Upper West Side campus. DailyMail.com gained access to the 'Gaza Solidarity Encampment,' which occupied the South Lawn where approximately 100 tents have been pitched by students who are calling for the university to cease any Israel-linked investments. Within the bustling 'encampment,' DailyMail.com reporters spotted packs of organic snacks, bakery take-outs and condiment stands scattered across tables, forming a makeshift canteen and buffet amidst the tents.

Far left groups supporting the Columbia students' sit in include a group that supported the Hamas attack of October 7 and a George Soros fund. Tensions continue to escalate at the Ivy League school where hundreds of pro-Palestine protesters are demanding that the institution divest from companies with ties to Israel. So far, more than 100 demonstrators have been arrested at the 'Gaza Solidarity Encampment', which is comprised of a coalition of 116 groups under the umbrella organization Columbia University Apartheid Divest.

This is all Obama. What you see happening right now in New York City. It all started at Columbia University way back in the early 1980’s. Obama was my Columbia U classmate. And now it’s all full circle back to our roots (excuse the pun). Columbia University is the canary in the coal mine. George HW Bush talked about “1,000 points of light.” Obama uses “1,000 points of destruction” to achieve his goal- the intentional destruction of America. You can see it all happening just blocks apart right now – all built around Columbia University and NYC. Upper Manhattan is...

Twelve Columbia University students who were suspended over an anti-Israel event on campus last month had their punishments lifted shortly after, their lawyer claimed — as the school continues to weather backlash over its handling of protesters on and near the Morningside Heights campus. About 16 students were initially suspended for failing to provide information about “a host of student activities,” including an “unauthorized” teach-in on the history of Palestinian resistance on March 24, Stanley Cohen told the Village Sun. The university suspected that the March 24 teach-in titled “Resistance 101” spotlighted a member of the Popular Front for the...

On the first night of Passover, the singsong of the Four Questions echoed from Jewish homes and gatherings around the world, including from unlikely, contested spaces: the center of pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia and other universities where demonstrations are taking place. As evening fell over Columbia’s tent encampment on Monday, about 100 students and faculty gathered in a circle around a blue tarp heaped with boxes of matzo and food they had prepared in a kosher kitchen. Some students wore kaffiyehs, the traditional Palestinian scarf, while others wore Jewish skullcaps. They distributed handmade Haggadahs — prayer books for the Passover...

How Columbia University became the epicenter of disagreement over the Israel-Hamas war (Can only be linked to, per FR rules.)