March 6, 2025 (EIRNS)—Columbia University’s pro-Palestinian student organizations have long complained and on March 5 the Student Government at its affiliated Barnard College sent an email to the student body, adding its voice to demand transparency in the disciplinary process in dealing with student protests. Columbia has twisted the 1964 Civil Rights Act to characterize any criticism of Israel as “discriminatory harassment,” and has established the draconian Office of Institutional Equity (OIE) to deal with all reports of “discrimination and discriminatory harassment at Columbia,” according to Murtaza Hussain on Drop Site. Student criticism of the United States is acceptable, but criticism of Israel is “discriminatory harassment.”
The murky administrative process of the OIE allows the university to investigate students, and faculty, and to impose punishment, and even nullify a graduation diploma that has already been granted. The charges can be made anonymously, with secret evidence. The defendant is only allowed to view the charges and evidence by signing a non-disclosure agreement. If the student refuses to sign this “gag order,” he or she will have no ability to participate in any defense. The university provost runs the OIE, and the staff includes several former state district attorneys. However, as corrupt as that sounds, punishment can be administered before any ruling is made.
This process applies to all questions of discrimination, but legal advisors report that it is overwhelmingly used in cases of speech that is critical of Israel. Amy Greer, a lawyer who has represented several students in this process, said, “Students are being pulled into these proceedings with very few due process protections and little to no transparency.” Students are required “to defend speech like posters or stickers that say ‘Stop Arming Israel,’ or Instagram posts that call for walkouts, or art exhibitions, or a communication that simply asks for change of class time in order to attend a protest.” Students and staff can be charged with “failure to report” on acts of others, which means being a witness is a criminal act. Virtually all hearings with students result in demands to name more student activists.
One Columbia student said that he received a request to meet with his “case manager,” because he violated the Civil Rights Act by putting up posters which “condemned Israel” and identified Israel as a “terrorist state.” He said, “I interpret this as an institutional attempt to silence me with a policy that directly contradicts First Amendment rights, and to instill fear about this subject to make sure people don’t speak about Gaza or Palestine. In my meeting I made the point that it seems that I am free to criticize the U.S. government at Columbia, but not Israel, and they had no answer for this.”
