Mideast fury at Columbia University continues

new york | A faculty committee investigating charges that Columbia University professors bullied pro-Israel students has issued its findings — but the controversy appears far from over.

The report found just one incident where a faculty member "exceeded commonly accepted bounds" in responding to a pro-Israel student's question about whether Israel warns Palestinians before it takes certain military actions in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

The report also found no evidence of statements by faculty that "could reasonably be construed as anti-Semitic."

But pro-Israel students, including some who were interviewed by the committee and said their stories were ignored in its findings, blasted the report. They said the ad hoc committee had made plain its intentions by focusing on only three instances of alleged intimidation, particularly accusations that had garnered the most media attention in recent months.

"We're ashamed that Columbia would undertake such a blatant whitewash," said Ariel Beery, one of the co-founders of Columbians for Academic Freedom, a student group that spearheaded the effort to publicize complaints about teachers in the Middle East and Asian Languages and Cultures department.

"They were more concerned with solving the problem that's posed to the university's image than addressing the injustices that were done to students," Beery said.

Meanwhile, several university faculty have reacted by slamming the report as a McCarthyist assault on academic freedom. Addressing some 300 to 400 members of the university community this week at an event sponsored by a group called Stop McCarthyism at Columbia, some of the professors also lashed out at Israel and Zionism.

"If some Columbia faculty are going to be stigmatized for being anti-Zionism, then let me be among them," said Noha Radwan, an assistant professor in the Middle East and Asian Languages & Cultures department. "I am anti-Zionism."

In late October of last year, the David Project, a pro-Israel advocacy group, screened "Columbia, Unbecoming," a documentary it made about student allegations of intimidation.

In December, university President Lee Bollinger announced the formation of the committee to investigate the film's allegations — such as the charge that assistant professor Joseph Massad asked an Israeli student who served in the army, "How many Palestinians have you killed?"

In a letter addressed to the Columbia community, Bollinger said he will announce specific actions in response to the report in the next two weeks, adding that the school has begun formulating its reaction.

"Some solutions are clear," he wrote. "We are developing new grievance procedures for students and faculty to help ensure that concerns are addressed in a clear, fair, and expeditious manner. We will also devise means to facilitate community-wide discussions of difficult and controversial issues of the day — the kinds of problems universities are meant to explore. Other plans will be laid out in time."