Latest news with #Davidai
Middle East Eye
11-07-2025
- Politics
- Middle East Eye
Pro-Israel professor Shai Davidai leaves Columbia University after 'mutual agreement'
An assistant professor who was accused of harassing pro-Palestinian students as well as staff at Columbia University has left the institution following a "mutual agreement" he will not return to teaching at the Ivy League school, according to a university official. Shai Davidai, a controversial pro-Israel advocate who taught at Columbia's business school, left the university on 8 July. His campus access had been restricted since October following the 'intimidation' of university employees. 'Assistant Professor of Business Shai Davidai has decided to depart Columbia, effective July 8, 2025,' a Columbia University spokesperson wrote in an email to Middle East Eye, adding: "Assistant Professor Davidai has chosen, by mutual agreement with the University, to not return to teaching at Columbia." 'The University thanks him for his service and wishes him the best in his future endeavors.' Davidai said in a post on X on Friday that he left the university because he did not trust 'the anti-Jewish, anti-Israel, and anti-American hate festering on [Columbia's] campus'. New MEE newsletter: Jerusalem Dispatch Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters 'I didn't leave Columbia to 'pursue other endeavors', he said. 'I left because I no longer trust its so-called leadership to confront the anti-Jewish, anti-Israel, and anti-American hate festering on campus. During my six years there, I met plenty of well-paid bureaucrats - but not once did I meet a true leader.' Davidai has been a vocal critic of Columbia and other universities for their response to pro-Palestinian protest encampments on US campuses against the war in Gaza, while also being accused of threatening behaviour to students and faculty at the institution. Davidai had been under investigation by Columbia's Office of Institutional Equality (OIE) into allegations of harassment made against him in February 2024. Davidai shared in a post on X on Thursday that Columbia had 'tried to smear' his name and that he 'wouldn't let them', sharing a letter from Laura Kirschstein, vice-provost at OIE, saying: 'On July 8, OIE closed its investigations relating to you without issuing any findings or conclusions of wrongdoing, and without imposing any discipline or penalty on you.' A university official said that any OIE investigations normally terminate when an individual "is no longer employed at the University" and consequently the investigation into Davidai had closed 'without issuing any findings or conclusions of wrongdoing'. Katherine Franke, a former law professor who had taught at Columbia University, shared on Instagram on Thursday a video of her showing a letter from OIE sent to students who had made allegations against Davidai, which said that the 'OIE process has been terminated without any determination', meaning that Davidai had not been absolved of wrongdoing, just that a determination wasn't made before he had left. Columbia University has been criticised for capitulating to the Trump administration's demands over its allegations of antisemitism. Access denied In October, Columbia University issued a statement regarding Davidai's access to the institution being restricted, saying, 'Columbia…does not tolerate threats of intimidation, harassment, or other threatening behaviour by its employees'. The university also said it had "temporarily limited his access to campus while he [Davidai] undertakes appropriate training on our policies governing the behavior of our employees". After he was barred, he took to Instagram to criticise the decision, saying that it was 'because of October 7th [2023]. Because I was not afraid to stand up to the hateful mob. And because I was not afraid to expose Mr fucking Cas Holloway'. Holloway is the chief operating officer at Columbia. That video has since been taken down, but Davidai shared many social media posts harassing Holloway. It was the second time the non-tenured Israeli professor had been barred from the campus in a year. He had also been barred on 22 April for around a month for threatening to do a pro-Israeli sit-in on a pro-Palestinian encampment. Harassment Davidai in April 2024 called pro-Palestine students "the Hitler Youth" on X (his post has subsequently been taken down) and used his social media accounts, where he has over 108,000 followers, to repeatedly call for the US National Guard to be brought into the protest encampment at Columbia. More than 13,000 students signed a petition asking for him to be fired because he used his 'personal social media accounts to target, harass, and bully students, including Palestinian students who have lost family members in Gaza'. As well as students accusing him of harassing them both in person and on social media, critics said he also endangered staff, students and faculty. For example, he called on Secretary of State Marco Rubio on a post on X for Columbia graduate and Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil to be deported from the US. This happened two days before he was picked up by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents dressed in plain clothes. Khalil was subsequently freed on 8 March after 104 days at a detention centre in Jena, Louisiana. In another incident, he tagged former faculty member Mohamed Abdou in posts with the FBI and Homeland Security. Abdou subsequently discovered he was "terminated" from a faculty position while watching on CSPAN, Columbia's antisemitism congressional hearing in April 2024. Abdou said his 'doxxing" and 'termination' was "irreparable'.
The Intercept
09-07-2025
- Politics
- The Intercept
Pro-Israel Professor Shai Davidai Is Leaving Columbia
Shai Davidai is leaving Columbia University. Per an email sent to Columbia Business School faculty on Wednesday morning from Dean Costis Maglaras and obtained by The Intercept, the vocal pro-Israel business school assistant professor made the decision to leave the school. Davidai soon followed the internal announcement with a social media post declaring that Columbia's Office of Institutional Equity had cleared him of allegations filed against him in February of last year. He was temporarily suspended last year after Columbia said he 'repeatedly harassed and intimidated University employees in violation of University policy.' 'BOOM,' Davidai wrote, alongside a screenshot of a note on Columbia letterhead from the Vice Provost for the Office of Institutional Equity. Davidai and a Columbia University spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Davidai, who joined the business school in 2019, received viral attention for his pro-Israel tirades and self-filmed videos of his confrontations with pro-Palestine protesters. Several students, including Mahmoud Khalil and Mohsen Mahdawi, have also alleged that Davidai targeted them and called for them to be deported in the lead-up to their arrests by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Davidai was also a member of a prominent WhatsApp group of Columbia alumni, parents and professors that strategized about how to deport pro-Palestine students, The Intercept reported. He has noted that he does not have tenure at the school.
Middle East Eye
14-04-2025
- Politics
- Middle East Eye
Palestinian Columbia University student detained by ICE during citizenship ceremony
A second Palestinian student at Columbia University was picked up and placed into detention by immigration agents on Monday during his naturalisation ceremony. Mohsen Mahdawi, a green card holder who moved from the occupied West Bank to the US ten years ago, was at the US immigration services offices in Colchester, Vermont, when he was detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, The Intercept reported. Mahdawi is being targeted for his pro-Palestine activism on campus despite the fact that he has not been active since the spring of 2024. On Monday, Mahdawi's lawyers filed a habeas corpus petition challenging the legality of his detention. They say the government has violated his statutory and due process rights by punishing him for speech related to Israel and Palestine. New MEE newsletter: Jerusalem Dispatch Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters He is facing deportation under a government provision that says they have 'reasonable ground to believe' the individual's presence in the country hurts the government's foreign policy interests. According to The Intercept, Mahdawi had played a leading role in the Columbia protests but stepped back to build "bridges with Jewish and Israeli communities on campus". Mahdawi had reportedly asked Columbia professor Shai Davidai, a pro-Israel professor who has been accused of harassing pro-Palestine students at Columbia University, to get coffee. The two met, but Mahdawi later said that Davidai left in the middle of the coffee. Less than two months after the meeting, Davidai posted a video of Mahdawi to Twitter in a thread characterising him and other protest organisers as "antisemitic" and "pro-Hamas". Since then, Mahdawi has been doxxed by Zionist groups like Canary Mission and Betar. Mahdawi has been sheltering in place and living in fear for more than three weeks since ICE picked up fellow activist Mahmoud Khalil. He said he asked Columbia for help with a safe place, but they refused. Immigration authorities scheduled the citizenship test at the Colchester citizenship and immigration services office but took Mahdawi into custody when he arrived. Now, Mahdawi is facing an order to deport him to the occupied West Bank, where attacks on Palestinians have been escalating from the Israeli military and Israeli settlers. Mahdawi joins others like Khalil, Rumeysa Ozturk, and Alireza Doroudi, who are all being held for their involvement in pro-Palestinian protests on campuses.
The Intercept
14-04-2025
- Politics
- The Intercept
Palestinian Student Leader Was Called In for Citizenship Interview — Then Arrested by ICE
Mohsen K. Mahdawi arrived at the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services office in Burlington, Vermont, on Monday. A Palestinian student at Columbia University, he hoped that, after 10 years in the U.S., he would pass the test to become a naturalized citizen. Instead, agents from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested him and began the process to deport him to the occupied West Bank. Mahdawi, a some leader of the campus protest movement against Israel's war on Gaza, becamed yet another green card holder arrested and facing removal. 'Mohsen Mahdawi was unlawfully detained today for no reason other than his Palestinian identity,' Mahdawi's attorney Luna Droubi said in a statement to The Intercept. 'He came to this country hoping to be free to speak out about the atrocities he has witnessed, only to be punished for such speech.' 'He came to this country hoping to be free to speak out about the atrocities he has witnessed, only to be punished for such speech.' Mahdawi was one of the leaders of the pro-Palestine student protest movement until Spring 2024, when he said he took a step back from the movement to focus on building bridges with Jewish and Israeli communities on campus. In December 2023, Mahdawi asked Columbia professor Shai Davidai, a controversial pro-Israel figure on at the school, to get coffee. The two met, but Mahdawi later said that Davidai left in the middle of the coffee. Less than two months after the meeting, Davidai posted a video of Mahdawi to Twitter in a thread characterizing him and other protest organizers as anti-Semitic and pro-Hamas. (Davidai did not immediately respond to a request for comment.) Since then, Mahdawi became a focus of attacks from a member of Congress and Zionist groups like Canary Mission and Betar. With Donald Trump's inauguration, groups like Betar and Canary Mission have been at the center of a push to place scrutiny on foreign students active in campus pro-Palestine movements; at Columbia, one behind-the-scenes push came from a WhatsApp group that included alumni and faculty at Columbia who organized to get the students deported. Davidai was a member of the group, though there's no indication he participated in talk of deportation, whether about Mahdawi or other students. (Davidai did not immediately respond to a request for comment.) Even before his friend and fellow Columbia activist Mahmoud Khalil was arrested by immigration authorities, Mahdawi asked university administrators to help him find a safe place to live so he would not be taken by ICE agents, according to emails reviewed by The Intercept. The school did nothing in response, Mahdawi said. After ICE abducted Khalil last month, Mahdawi sheltered in place for more than three weeks for fear of being picked up himself. Instead of taking him off the street, however, immigration authorities scheduled the citizenship test at the Burlington USCIS office and took Mahdawi into custody when he arrived. Now, Mahdawi is facing an order to deport him to the occupied West Bank, where escalating attacks from both the Israeli military and Jewish settlers have led to increased casualties among Palestinians. 'It's kind of a death sentence,' Mahdawi said. 'Because my people are being killed unjustly in an indiscriminate way.' 'I will be either living or imprisoned or killed by the apartheid system.' His fears arise from the toll Israel's attacks and occupation have taken on Mahdawi's family. Growing up in the West Bank, his community has suffered losses for years. He said he lost his childhood best friend, his uncle, two cousins, several of whom were killed in the second intifada, a Palestinian uprising against occupation that lasted from 2000 to 2005. More recently, he lost two cousins in the growing violence in the occupied Palestinian territories since the October 7 attacks, Mahdawi said. His aunts and uncles' homes have been destroyed and his father's store was blown up as part of the violence in the West Bank city of Jenin. Now, he is the ninth Columbia student targeted for deportation as hundreds across the country have had their visas revoked under the Trump administration's sweeps and abductions of immigrants. Mahdawi is one of the few cases of legal permanent residents arrested, meaning he did not have a student visa revoked, but is facing an effort by the government to cancel his green card. Other permanentresidents have faced deportation over allegations that they violated immigration law or had their residency revoked over pro-Palestinian views. 'This is the outcome,' Mahdawi said. 'I will be either living or imprisoned or killed by the apartheid system.' Read our complete coverage In December 2023, Mahdawi appeared in a '60 Minutes' segment focused on antisemitism on college campuses. Mahdawi criticized how Columbia's then-President Minouche Shafik had responded to the October 7 attacks, saying that she was ignoring the plight of Palestinians. And, a past leader of Columbia's Palestinian student union, Mahdawi said pro-Israel factions on campus wanted to silence those protesting genocide. In the wake of the interview, he became the subject of increasing surveillance and attacks from Zionist groups. He said he also started receiving death threats. Canary Mission and Stop AntiSemitism on campus, two Zionist groups that have become hubs for doxxing and bullying of pro-Palestinian activists, created profiles for him. The profiles claimed that Mahdawi, whose activist work centered on finding peaceful resolutions to conflicts between Israelis, American Jews, and Palestinians, was anti-Israel and pro-Hamas. By late 2024, Mahdawi was visited at his apartment by an FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force official. Mahdawi said he is still unsure of the purpose of the FBI visit. Mahdawi said Columbia refused to provide him with video footage of his apartment complex capturing the visit. (Columbia did not immediately respond to a request for comment.) Then, in early 2025 Trump formalized his plans to deport pro-Palestine student protesters with an executive order. Shortly after, Betar, which said it sent a list of students it wanted deported to the White House, posted about Mahdawi. So did the group Documenting Jew Hatred on Campus at ColumbiaU, which is run by a member of the pro-Israel WhatsApp group that worked to deport students. The group posted multiple times about Mahdawi and other organizers, tagging law enforcement agencies. Shortly afterward, Mahdawi went into hiding. In response to a final email last month pleading with the school to move him to a safe location, a high-ranking official in the Columbia administration wrote, 'The University's outside counsel will be in touch with your counsel.' Mahdawi's lawyer said Columbia responded and said they could not give him safe campus housing where he would be better insulated from ICE. Last month, Betar posted about Mahdawi again. The group said Mahdawi was part of a group of students Betar was confident would 'shortly be deported.' Earlier this month, Mahdawi received an email from USCIS notifying him that he was scheduled to conduct an interview to obtain his U.S. citizenship. He said he was expecting the interview to take place in December or January, in line with the expected timeline to move from his green card status through the naturalization process. When he received the email, however, he was worried it might be a trap. In anticipation of the worst, Mahdawi contacted his representatives in the Congress, including Sens. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt. and Peter Welch, D-Vt., as well as Rep. Becca Balint, D-Vt., to make them aware of his situation and ask them to intervene if possible. Read Our Complete Coverage Mahdawi said he spoke personally with Welch, who said his office would be on standby pending what happened with Mahdawi's case. Offices for Sanders and Balint said they would remain on standby pending news of Mahdawi's status after the interview. (Welch, Sanders, and Balint did not immediately respond to requests for comment.) Mahdawi said the government's efforts to chill speech went beyond issues related to Israel or Palestine. 'That's why they're crushing universities now, it's not only about Palestine,' Mahdawi said. As for his hopes of becoming a U.S. citizen one day and continuing his master's degree studies at Columbia's School of International and Public Affairs, Mahdawi's future is unclear. 'People ask me why I would want to become a citizen of a country committing genocide,' Mahdawi said. 'I have faith in the people living in this country. The government is not the people.'
Fox News
06-03-2025
- Politics
- Fox News
Fox News ‘Antisemitism Exposed' Newsletter: A professor stands up to Columbia's tolerance of hate
Fox News' "Antisemitism Exposed" newsletter brings you stories on the rising anti-Jewish prejudice across the U.S. and the world. IN TODAY'S NEWSLETTER: - Columbia professor slams university leadership as anti-Israel agitators wreak havoc- 13 American universities slapped with 'F' grade on campus antisemitism- NY gov demands state university take down 'Palestinian Studies' job posting TOP STORY: One brave Columbia University professor has had enough of the anti-Jewish hatred that he says the school's leadership has allowed to go unchecked. After recent protests at the school's Barnard College, Shai Davidai told Fox News Digital the faculty has created a monster. "This is the consequence of 20 years of indoctrination," Davidai told Fox News Digital, "We have indoctrinated students and they are not the problem. The problem has always been the professors who have been indoctrinating them." VIDEO: Anti-Israel protesters who wave flags of terror groups like Hamas and Hezbollah could face jail time in New York should lawmakers pass a proposed bill. The office of New York State Senator Brad Hoylman-Sigal, who is a Democrat, confirmed to Fox News that he is introducing the Stand Against Flags of Enemy Terrorists Act. WATCH HERE: WORST OF THE WORST: Thirteen universities across the United States received "F" grades in the 2025 Campus Antisemitism Report Card released Monday by the Anti-Defamation League. The survey of 135 schools – which is meant to provide information "about the current state of antisemitism on campus and how universities and colleges are responding," according to the ADL – grades them from A to F based on 30 different criteria. Click here to find out if you're sending one tuition money. PROBLEMATIC POSTING: New York Gov. Kathy Hochul ordered City University of New York (CUNY) to spike a "Palestinian Studies" professorship posting that would have allegedly peddled antisemitic and anti-Israel discourse with topics like "apartheid," "settler colonialism," "genocide" and more. The governor ordered the school to conduct a thorough review of the position to ensure that antisemitic theories are not promoted. DEAL WITH DEVILS: White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt defended U.S. efforts to negotiate with Hamas to release American hostages during a briefing on Wednesday. There are currently five hostages with U.S. citizenship in Gaza, though most are feared dead. Leavitt said Israel was "consulted on this matter," and that President Donald Trump believes in putting forth "good faith effort[s] to do what's right for the American people." GUEST EDITORIAL: Retired FBI agent David Zimmerman reminds readers that 45 Americans were kidnapped and 12 murdered by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023. Zimmerman, an active-duty FBI agent stationed in Israel from 2020 to 2024, writes that he is "shocked that most Americans do not realize the extent of the suffering our own citizens endured and continue to endure at the hands of Hamas." QUOTE OF THE WEEK: "Hate doesn't go away on its own. Extremism doesn't go away on its own. If you don't deal with it, it stays around." Columbia associate professor Shai Davidai. - Looking for more on this topic? Find more antisemitism coverage from Fox News here. - Did someone forward you this email? Subscribe to additional newsletters from Fox News here. - Want live updates? Get the Fox News app here
