Columbia University’s antisemitism task force released the first in a series of reports Monday, verifying allegations from Jewish students of a culture of hostility on the school’s campus and supporting recommendations for a revamped demonstration policy.

The committee, composed of 13 professors at Columbia and two from affiliate institutions Barnard College and Teachers College, began its first report with an endorsement of a set of interim policies for on-campus protests which the university released in February. Before explaining the specifics, the task force members summarized the conditions on the ground for Jewish Columbia students:

“While mourning Hamas’s unspeakable atrocities on October 7, some Jewish and Israeli Columbia affiliates have been the object of racist epithets and graffiti, antisemitic tropes, and confrontational and unwelcome questions, while others have found their participation in some student groups that have nothing to do with politics to be increasingly uncomfortable,” the report reads.

The committee goes on to note that Israeli students have “been criticized and stereotyped for serving in the military” and have “heard chants at protests like ‘Globalize the Intifada’ and ‘Death to the Zionist State’ as calls for violence against them and their families.” Some students have even been physically harmed at protests, the report said.

In discussing demonstration guidelines, the task force affirmed the university’s commitment to free expression and the “exchange of views and ideas,” but stressed that the right to speak freely does not include the ability to shout down others, commit acts of vandalism, disrupt classes, or physically attack other students. In what reads like a reference to the congressional hearing in which three elite university presidents demurred when asked whether calls for the genocide of Jews constitutes a violation of their respective schools’ policies, the committee emphasized that those at Columbia should not “be free to engage in violence or to call for violence against members of our community or groups to which they belong.”

To achieve its goals of holding students to the demonstration guidelines while still allowing protests to take place in accordance with those rules, the committee called on the university to address violations “in real-time” rather than after the fact, doing “more to stop unauthorized protests as they occur, using approaches that are effective but not confrontational.” It also raised the issue of masked protesters, arguing that “a more proactive effort is needed to identify them during demonstrations.”

The report suggests that the committee’s recommendations could also be applied to combat Islamophobia and other forms of discrimination, but notes that Columbia has taken reports of antisemitism on its campus less seriously than accusations of discrimination or harassment of other groups.

“In recent years, it has become increasingly common at Columbia to defer to a protected class’s views,” the report reads. “But when some Israeli and Jewish Columbia affiliates have complained about phrases or comments in recent months, the response has been different, defending the intentions and free speech rights of the speakers. While there are important reasons to value the perspective of both the speaker and the audience, the University must be consistent in its approach.”

Columbia president Minouche Shafik issued a statement after the release of the report Monday, saying she was “grateful to the co-chairs and task force members” and appreciated the committee’s “suggestions about reporting, enforcement, anti-discrimination, and other issues”:

Shai Davidai, an assistant professor at Columbia Business School who has become a leading figure in the fight against antisemitism on college campuses, told National Review that — though he welcomes the work the committee is doing — the emphasis on protest policies demonstrates that the university administration has neglected to solve issues it is tasked with addressing.

“I applaud the very meticulous and important report that the task force published, which shows its members’ dedication to the issue,” Davidai said. “Yet my main concern with his report is that its relationship to antisemitism is tenuous at best. Columbia does not have a problem with protest policy; it has a problem with the administration’s refusal to enforce that policy. It is beyond me why a volunteer task force that is supposed to fight antisemitism is tasked with doing the university’s job.”

Echoing the sentiments in the section of the report that mentioned double standards between Jews and others on Columbia’s campus, Davidai asked whether a similar committee focusing on a different minority group would be in the same situation:

You would never expect an anti-racism or anti-sexism task force to deal with issues related to protest policy, so why is the administration treating an antisemitism task force differently? I am looking forward to the future reports by the task force, which I hope will deal with the actual root causes of antisemitism on campus: Hamas-sympathizing professors who use their power to indoctrinate students, pro-terror, antisemitic student organizations who operate with complete impunity on campus, and an administration headed by a president and vice presidents who, at best, are indifferent to the concerns of Jewish and Israeli students, faculty, and staff.

National Review contacted Columbia for comment on both the protest policies outlined in the report — specifically the section addressing masked demonstrators — and Davidai’s concerns but had not received a response at press time.