Confidential letter shows Columbia professor who called Hamas attack ‘awesome’ is under investigation

President of Columbia University Dr. Nemat (Minouche) Shafik testifies during a House hearing about antisemitism on college campuses, on April 17, 2024. Photo by Getty Images

By Jacob Kornbluh April 17, 2024

A confidential letter obtained by the Forward shows that investigations have been opened over the conduct of several Columbia University professors accused of making antisemitic and anti-Israel comments in the aftermath of Hamas’ Oct 7 attacks.

The letter expands on the testimony of the university’s president, who was  grilled on Capitol Hill Wednesday over a pair of professors, one accused of celebrating Hamas Oct. 7 attacks on Israel and another accused of making bigoted generalizations about Israeli students.

What had President Nemat “Minouche” Shafik done about it, pressed Rep. Elise Stefanik, the Republican whose interrogations of the presidents of Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania over antisemitism late last year led to their resignations.

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This time, Shafik was in the hot seat at a hearing of the House Committee on Education & the Workforce. But she would not reveal the extent to which Columbia had dealt with the incidents Stefanik wanted her to elaborate on.

What Shafik declined to disclose at the hearing is that investigations have been opened into both of the professors Stefanik asked about — and others. A letter Columbia officials submitted to the House committee, which was marked confidential and obtained by the Forward, shows outside investigators are handling the inquiries.   

The letter also states that several other professors are also facing internal investigations over allegedly antisemitic remarks. 

Earlier in the hearing Shafik had said that Joseph Massad, a professor of modern Arab politics and intellectual history, “had been spoken to” and told that his “language was unacceptable” after he was accused of  praising the Hamas attacks.

Stefanik also wanted to know how Shafik had dealt with Katherine Franke, a law professor and a staunch critic of Israel, who has been accused of smearing Israeli students at Columbia.

It was only later in the hearing, when questioned by a Democrat, that Shafik commented on the investigations. From the letter Columbia submitted to the committee, it seems that she may have been concerned about breaching confidentiality.

A spokesperson for Stefanik didn’t immediately respond to whether or not the congresswoman was aware of the document before she questioned Shafik.

Massad, of Palestinian Christian descent, heads Columbia’s academic review committee. Shafik seems to have agreed with Stefanik during the hearing that he should be removed as chair. Massad was the subject of a petition that called for his removal from the faculty over an article he wrote in which he referred to Hamas attack on Israel on Oct. 7 as “remarkable” and “awesome” and a resistance to “Israeli settler-colonialism and racism toward the Palestinians.”

Shafik testified with others from Columbia, including David Greenwald, the co-chair of its board of trustees, and law and economics professor David Schizer. The panel was  asked the same question Stefanik asked the presidents of Harvard, MIT and the University in December: whether calling for the genocide of Jews violated the university’s code of conduct?

“Yes it does,” they all responded to Rep. Suzanne Bonamici, a Democrat from Oregon. 

Former Harvard President Claudine Gay and former University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill declined to give the straight “yes or no” answer to the question that Stefanik demanded when they came before the committee.

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