Imagine a place where Jewish voices are systematically silenced, where the very leaders of an educational institution turn a blind eye to antisemitism and even promote it. This is the shocking reality revealed in a recent report, exposing the dark underbelly of the City University of New York (CUNY).
A University's Dark Turn
Once a haven for Jewish students and staff, CUNY has undergone a dramatic transformation. The report, titled 'How CUNY Became the Most Systemically Antisemitic US University in Just Two Years,' paints a disturbing picture. It highlights how CUNY deliberately reduced engagement with Jewish schools, cut advertising in Jewish media, and seemingly stopped recruiting Jewish employees.
In the early 2000s, CUNY boasted a significant Jewish presence in its leadership, with many campus presidents and senior administrators identifying as Jewish. However, by the late 2010s, this had changed drastically. By March 2023, not a single Jew held a campus president or senior leadership position at CUNY, despite New York City's Jewish population being around 20%.
Anti-Zionism and BDS: A Troubling Trend
But here's where it gets controversial. CUNY's leadership, on both management and labor sides, has been accused of being 'infected' with anti-Zionist sentiments and support for the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement. Private emails obtained by the report's authors reveal that CUNY Chancellor Felix Matos Rodriguez has championed the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), an organization with a questionable track record. Rodriguez even hired a former CAIR director and BDS activist as CUNY's top discrimination officer, and attempted to include the controversial 'Jerusalem Declaration of Antisemitism' in CUNY's discrimination process, which many see as an attempt to undermine the widely accepted International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism.
Honoring Antisemites and Ignoring Victims
CUNY has also come under fire for platforming known antisemites and pro-terror individuals. In 2022, the Law School invited Nerdeen Kiswani, founder of Within Our Lifetime, to deliver a commencement address. Kiswani has a history of calling for death to Israelis, praising Hamas, and advocating for an intifada. This incident occurred just a month after CUNY faculty union leaders marched alongside Kiswani, demanding the ousting of Zionist faculty members.
Additionally, in 2017, CUNY invited Linda Sarsour to deliver a commencement address, despite nearly 9,000 petition signatures imploring the university not to honor her due to her long history of antisemitic comments and bigotry towards Jews.
A Culture of Discrimination and Retaliation
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) found in 2021 that CUNY's Kingsborough campus and the PSC faculty union were discriminating against Orthodox and Zionist Jews, banning them from faculty groups, and harassing and retaliating against them. The EEOC also determined that events were scheduled on Friday nights to block observant Jews from attending.
Despite these findings, CUNY has failed to respond or even meet with the victims. President Claudia Schrader refused to speak with the Jewish victims of the EEOC findings, including one who reports directly to her. Schrader also refused to condemn a KCC student who assaulted an orthodox Jew with a baseball bat, yelling, "Kill all the Jews!"
The report highlights how CUNY's response to complaints of antisemitism is worrying. Two professors who complained about antisemitism in February 2023 were immediately placed under investigation, and the University refused to provide them with a copy of the complaint.
A Culture of Antisemitism at the Highest Levels
"Egregious retaliatory behavior like this is one of the many factors that currently make CUNY an unsafe place for Jews," the report states. It notes that over a dozen legal actions have been filed against the university in recent years, but CUNY has never responded to any of them.
"At the highest levels, we have found that the university doesn't merely misunderstand antisemitism; its leaders actively work to reject and detract from the very meaning of antisemitism as defined by the overwhelming majority of Jews," the report continues.
There is evidence that these antisemitic views are not just tolerated but rewarded within CUNY.
S.A.F.E. CAMPUS, started by CUNY law professor Jeffrey Lax, advocates for Zionist Jews facing discrimination and exclusion on college campuses. Following the report's publication, Lax said, "Long before the nation was talking about widely infested campus antisemitism, we told you that it was coming and detailed exactly how it was happening across one of the largest and the most antisemitic universities."
