New York, NY, November 10, 2023 – The American Jewish Congress welcomes Columbia University’s announcement of the temporary suspension of the chapters of National Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) and Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP).
All Americans have seen that these groups threaten, intimidate, and endanger the safety of Jewish students on campus and are in truth, by their very actions, not student groups, but organized antisemitic mobs. They do not deserve official recognition and certainly do not deserve funding from the institutions to further their intent and perverse activities and create a hostile environment for Jewish students on campus.
We hope that today’s decision indicates a reckoning by U.S. academic institutions’ leadership about the gravity and scale of antisemitism on campus. Nevertheless, more needs to be done and we encourage Columbia to make this decision permanent.
SJP and JVP have left no doubt about where they stand on the terror group Hamas with their defense and justification of the horrific October 7 terror attack, and for that, they should be permanently banned.
Moreover, all academic institutions should follow suit.
(Photo credit: Jeenah Moon/Reuters)
