Copyright New York Post
A pair of Long Island twins are blasting Columbia for allowing antisemitism to run rampant, alleging in a new lawsuit that the university’s trustees continue to foster Jew hate on campus. Jewish students at Columbia University are subjected to an “institutional tolerance for antisemitism” that manifests across campus, including in the lecture halls, seniors David and Jonathan Lederer, 23, claim in the federal discrimination suit. “Just this week, a student brought up the war between Israel and Gaza, and the professor goes, ‘Poor choice of words,'” recalled David, who is studying financial engineering. “And the kid said, ‘What? Genocide?’ And the professor goes, ‘Better.'” Harassment on campus has been continuous since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israeli civilians, with both brothers accosted by “radical student protestors” and “called slurs like ‘kike,’ ‘Zionist pig,’ and ‘baby killer,'” according to the court filing. In March, the Trump administration announced that it canceled $400 million in federal grants over the Ivy League school’s noncompliance with anti-discrimination laws. The administration accused Columbia of violating civil rights law by “acting with deliberate indifference toward student-on-student harassment of Jewish students” since the start of the war in Gaza. The twins have also been repeatedly doxxed online and been followed by mobs of masked protestors, screaming obscenities and yelling at them to go back to Poland, the suit, filed in Manhattan federal court, states. They were also among the students who were blocked from university property by members of the faculty, including professor Mahmood Mamdani, the father of controversial mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, a Democratic socialist. “None of those faculty members were punished, and many reman in positions of power at the school,” Jonathan, a computer science major, told The Post. “Structural antisemitism is still there. The same culture exists.” Jonathan was punched in the face during a Dec. 9, 2024, rally by Tarek Bazrouk, an affiliate of Within Our Lifetime, a New York City-based Palestinian-led community organization. The attack happened on 116th Street and Broadway, as the brothers from Woodmere were speaking to a journalist. “He also ripped an Israeli flag out of David’s hand and called Jonathan and David ‘Nazis,'” reads the lawsuit, noting “Bazrouk was arrested and charged with a hate crime for the assault.” The FBI also reportedly “discovered antisemitic text messages on Bazrouk’s phone … and weapons in his apartment,” with the lawsuit also alleging that Bazrouk was a member of a group chat “that received regular updates from the official spokesperson of Hamas’ military wing.” This week, Bazrouk was sentenced to 17 months in jail for the hate-fueled attack. “My hope is this [lawsuit leads to] structural change, and that Jewish students don’t face the type of antisemitism we did,” Jonathan explained. “I don’t want them to feel powerless in the face of antisemitism, like were were.” The brothers even left campus temporarily in April 2024, as other Jewish students did, after Rabbi Elie Buechler warned them that Columbia was no longer safe for Jews. “We are looking for accountability,” David added, “and justice for what we faced. I don’t think any other student or minority group should go through what Jewish students have gone through at Columbia, and I think there has to be consequences when … antisemitism is allowed to remain rampant.” The university’s Student Conduct team routinely imposes excessive sanctions on Jewish or Zionist students while imposing minimal to no sanctions on non-Jewish or anti-Zionist students, according to the lawsuit. “While Columbia routinely creates safe spaces for, educates against hate toward, and promotes inclusion of other minority groups, Columbia routinely tolerates harassment, intimidation, and discrimination toward Jewish students,” the court filing claims. Despite the threats and intimidation, the twins never considered transferring, they said. “I was not going to leave because I knew if we did, there would be no one talking on our behalf, no one talking on behalf of future Jewish students,” Jonathan said. The brothers are seeking unspecified punitive and compensatory damages. They also want the university to acknowledge it violated the Civil Rights Act of 1964 through its alleged antisemitic actions. Columbia did not return The Post’s request for comment.
