The College Fix

University condemns student-led newspaper, announces investigation

Students for Justice in Palestine at Columbia University recently launched an anti-Israel newspaper on campus that reportedly “glorifies violence” against Israel.

The university has launched an investigation and condemned the newspaper, titled “The Columbia Intifada.” However, one free speech group argues the publication is protected speech.

SJP has distributed 1,000 copies of the magazine’s first issue containing articles such as “‘Zionist Peace Means Palestinian Blood,’ ‘The Myth of the Two-State Solution’ and a handy ‘Guide to Wheatpasting’ — a method of vandalizing public surfaces with propaganda fliers or other messaging,” The New York Post reported Friday.

The word “Intifada” in the magazine’s title references “Two violent uprisings by Palestinians in Israel’s recent history…in which terrorists besieged the nation with violence, often including horrific attacks against innocent civilians, with the stated goal of bringing the Jewish state to its knees,” The Post reported.

“This slogan is generally understood as a call for indiscriminate violence against Israel, and potentially against Jews and Jewish institutions worldwide,” according to the Anti-Defamation League.

Columbia SJP posted images of the newspaper on X, encouraging students to read it.

HOT OFF THE PRESSES! Columbia SJP’s official newspaper, The Columbia Intifada, is available at today’s read-in at Butler Library, room 301! pic.twitter.com/0IWHPw7f0e

— Columbia Students for Justice in Palestine (@ColumbiaSJP) December 4, 2024

New York Congressman Mike Lawler called the publication “outrageous” in a post on X.

“If Columbia cannot protect Jewish students on their campus, they should lose federal funding and have their tax-exempt status revoked,” he stated.

“And for those students here on a visa engaged in an ‘intifada’ against American students of the Jewish faith? Deport them,” Lawler stated.

A university spokesperson told The Post that Columbia denounces the publication and its “unauthorized association with the school by name.”

“Using the Columbia name for a publication that glorifies violence and makes individuals in our community feel targeted in any way is a breach of our values,” the spokesperson stated.

The school also condemned “discrimination and promoting violence or terror” and announced that it is “investigating this incident through… applicable offices and policies.”

Several students, including junior Brooke Chasalow, have criticized the magazine as “hateful.”

“When I see stuff like that, the title, ‘Myth of the Two-State Solution,’ these people don’t want peace,” Chasalow said.

“I don’t think we should encourage that stuff,” she told The Post, adding, “Free speech is a wonderful thing, but it’s not ‘any speech.’”

Not everyone thinks the school’s investigation is warranted, however. The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression condemned the university for investigating the magazine, calling it an infringement on free speech in a post on X.

“Our review of newspaper images available online has revealed nothing but protected expression and political advocacy. Columbia cannot investigate such speech without breaking with its stated free expression promises,” FIRE stated.

“Free expression principles demand that the university refrain from investigating even offensive speech unless it falls into a strictly defined category of unprotected expression such as incitement to imminent lawless action or seriously expressing an intent to commit a specific act of unlawful violence,” the free speech group stated.

MORE: Columbia’s fall semester kicks off with vandalism, anti-Israel protest

IMAGE: VicHinterlang/Shutterstock

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