The U.S. Department of Education said in a Feb. 3 statement that it is investigating allegations of anti-Semitism at five colleges, including Columbia University and the University of California–Berkeley.
The department’s Office for Civil Rights is launching the investigations in response to what it described as an explosion of anti-Semitism on American university campuses following the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led terrorist attack against Israel.
Officials are probing Northwestern University, Portland State University, and the University of Minnesota Twin Cities, in addition to Columbia and Berkeley.
“Too many universities have tolerated widespread antisemitic harassment and the illegal encampments that paralyzed campus life last year, driving Jewish life and religious expression underground,” Craig Trainor, acting assistant secretary for civil rights, said in a statement….