Columbia University launching investigation against latest anti-Israel vandals
A group of protesters clogged the sewage system of Columbia’s international affairs school, and spray painted the business school with an antisemitic slur

Victor J. Blue for The Washington Post via Getty Images
Students protest against the war in Gaza on the anniversary of the Hamas attack on Israel at Columbia University in New York, New York, on Monday, October 7, 2024.
Columbia University’s administration has launched an investigation — together with law enforcement — to identify the perpetrators of an act of vandalism on Wednesday in which anti-Israel demonstrators clogged the sewage system in the School of International and Public Affairs building with cement and sprayed the business school with red paint.
Columbia defined the spray-painting as an “act of vandalism” in a Wednesday statement, adding that the graffiti “included disturbing, personal attacks.” It said it was “acting swiftly to address this misconduct” and “to identify the individual perpetrators and address their actions.”
“The university has done a better job [responding to antisemitic incidents] compared to in the past year, but at the same time, the actions of these perpetrators has gotten a lot worse,” a second-year graduate student in SIPA who requested to remain anonymous told Jewish Insider. “This went from antisemitic vitriol to cementing toilets and causing staff to be there overnight scrubbing fecal matter out of the toilets.”
In a Wednesday night email to SIPA students, the school’s dean, Keren Yarhi-Milo, wrote that the women’s restrooms on four floors of the building were “vandalized with a cement-like substance causing the toilets to clog.” The walls of the 15th floor restroom were also spray-painted, as was the business school’s Kravis Hall, according to the email.
The Columbia Spectator reported that the graffiti included the phrase “Keren eat Weiner,” a reference to Yarhi-Milo and Rebecca Weiner, the NYPD’s deputy commissioner of intelligence and counterterrorism, as well as “5.3.2018-1.29.2024 Hind called we must answer” and “Im scared please help – HIND AGE 6,” a reference to Hind Rajab, a Palestinian girl killed during the war in Gaza.
In April of last year, at the start of the illegal anti-Israel encampment movement, protesters occupied Hamilton Hall and unfurled a banner that read “Hind’s Hall,” announcing that they had renamed the building in her honor. New York City Resists with Gaza, Columbia University Apartheid Divest and Students for Justice in Palestine claimed responsibility for the vandalism in a social media post.
Columbia’s response comes as the university has reacted more quickly to antisemitism in recent weeks — a sharp contrast compared to what lawmakers and Jewish students and faculty have called a slow, or nonexistent, response to the frequent antisemitism occurring on campus since the Oct. 7 attacks in Israel. Last week, the university suspended a university affiliate for participation in a masked demonstration in which four people barged into a History of Modern Israel class, banged on drums, chanted “free Palestine” and distributed posters to students that read “CRUSH ZIONISM” with a boot over the Star of David.
Columbia’s Office of Student Affairs also mandated on Wednesday that a SIPA group chat, intended to distribute campus-related information to students, be restricted to “administrator-only” mode after several incidents of students espousing antisemitic rhetoric in conversations, a student familiar with the situation told JI.
“We have been monitoring the chats closely and while the discussions are warranted, we have been mandated by the OSA to pause all cohort group chats temporarily till we convene to find a resolution to the ongoing discussions. … I would urge everyone to reflect on how we can reinforce civility in our discourse as we navigate this,” an administrator wrote in one cohort chat, according to messages obtained by JI.
The SIPA graduate student described antisemitic rhetoric in the students’ chat to JI as “a constant stream of pretty outrageous messages.”
“It quickly devolved into the same two or three students from our cohort invoking the Holocaust,” he said. “OSA is getting the handcuffs on these [perpetrators] more quickly than they were last year.”
Asked whether the perpetrators of Wednesday’s vandalism would be suspended or expelled once identified, a spokesperson for Columbia told JI that the university won’t comment further.