Reading the report issued last month by Columbia University’s Task Force on Antisemitism, one could be forgiven for thinking that it describes the University of Heidelberg, circa 1933. It contains accounts of observant Jews being harassed and assaulted, and open calls for the murder of Jews. But no, this is not Nazi Germany. This is the Upper West Side of Manhattan in 2024. There—in one of the nation’s most elite enclaves of higher learning—the oldest hatred is alive and well, gussied up in academic robes. 

The admittedly “serious and pervasive” antisemitic incidents detailed by the report are disturbing. Even more troubling is the extent to which Columbia faculty and administrators were complicit in the problem. ...

The gaslighting is astonishing. Moreover, the report’s key recommendation—more training on what constitutes antisemitism—misses the point.