Hatred Exposed: Texts from Columbia Leaders Mocking Jew-hatred Event Released

July 5, 2024

by: Andrew Bernard ~ JNS

Friday, 5 July 2024 | The House Committee on Education and the Workforce released the full chain of text messages from four Columbia University administrators who mocked concerns about anti-Semitism.

During a May 31 event titled “Jewish Life on Campus: Past, Present and Future,” three of the administrators traded jokes about Jewish campus leaders exploiting anti-Semitism to raise money and questioned the experiences of Jews and Israelis on the Ivy League school’s campus.

“He knows exactly what he’s doing and how to take full advantage of this moment,” wrote Matthew Patashnick, associate dean for student and family support. “Huge fundraising potential.”

Cristen Kromm, dean of undergraduate student life, “liked” the message.

“Amazing what $$$$ can do,” she added in response to the discussion of an opinion article penned by a campus rabbi.

“This panel is really making the administration look like jokers,” wrote Susan Chang-Kim, vice dean and chief administrative officer of Columbia College, at another place in the thread.

Chang-Kim also criticized the role that Columbia’s Kraft Center for Jewish Life on Campus played as a haven for Jewish students during anti-Israel protests.

“Comes from such a place of privilege,” she added. “Hard to hear the ‘Woe is me, we need to huddle at the Kraft center.’”

The university is investigating all three administrators, whom it has suspended.

Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.), chairwoman of the House committee who has been leading an investigation into Jew-hatred on campus, said that the texts were proof that Jews at Columbia are being undermined by their own administrators.

“Jewish students deserve better than to have harassment and threats against them dismissed as ‘privilege,’ and Jewish faculty members deserve better than to be mocked by their colleagues,” Foxx said. “These text messages once again confirm the need for serious accountability across Columbia’s campus.”

Portions of text messages were first reported by the Washington Free Beacon in June; the release is the first time that the full exchange has been shared. The inclusion of time stamps allows for an approximation of what the administrators were replying to and when.

On June 4, Columbia settled a lawsuit filed by a Jewish student who alleged that the university had created a hostile environment for Jews in violation of federal civil rights law.

The text messages released on Tuesday reveal that Columbia’s administrators were dismissive of allegations of Jew-hatred on campus only days earlier.

Orly Mishan, Columbia class of 1994, who described herself as the daughter of a Holocaust survivor and an Arab Jew who had to leave his country, tearfully told the May 31 panel that her daughter, a rising junior at Columbia, had entirely retreated from Jewish life in response to her experiences on campus.

“After October 7, she stopped doing anything that was Jewish,” Mishan said. “She would say that she’s hiding in plain sight.”

“My daughter finally did break down towards the end of the semester and called me and said, ‘Mom, I can’t eat. I can’t focus. I have to get off campus,’” Mishan added. She added that her daughter did not return for a week and a half.

While Mishan talked about her daughter’s experience, Columbia administrators messaged each other.

“Omg,” Chang-Kim wrote. “What the h*ll is this?”

“This is crazy,” she added.

Posted on July 5, 2024

Source: (Excerpt from an article originally published by the Jewish News Syndicate on July 2, 2024. Time-related language has been modified to reflect our republication today. See original article at this link.)

Photo Credit: terimakasih0/Pixabay/jns.org