A month after the Hamas massacres in Israel on October 7, 2023, Talia Dror, a student at Cornell University, appeared before a US House of Representatives’ committee to describe Cornell’s anti-Jewish campus climate. “Jewish students received threats,” she said, which included, “If I see another Jew on campus, I will stab you and slit your throat . . . glory to Hamas; liberation by any means necessary.”[1] These shocking anti-Jewish declarations were just a sampling of what occurred at Cornell and at many other universities across America.

College campuses often magnify wider society trends, including antisemitism, and Jewish organizations like the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) consistently track that data. In 2024, the ADL recorded 9,354 antisemitic incidents in the United States, a 344-percent increase from the previous five years and the highest number on record since the ADL began documenting nearly a half century ago.[2] Eighteen percent of those incidents happened on campuses. These statistics closely align with the more than 1,800 antisemitic incidents that Hillel International, the largest Jewish student organization, recorded on US campuses during the 2024-2025 academic year.[3]

But while campus antisemitism has recently intensified, it is not new. University quotas limiting Jewish students were in place from the early twentieth century until the 1960s in North America.[4] Still, anti-Jewish rhetoric, vandalism, and assaults seen on campuses since October 7 are unprecedented, particularly at world-renowned universities like Harvard, Columbia, and the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).

Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) Movement

Campus antisemitism is bolstered significantly by the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement, which often works through anti-Israel student groups like Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), a network of 250-plus clubs in North America. BDS is an international campaign that began about twenty years ago to discredit and isolate Israel and its supporters financially, academically, and professionally.[5] BDS’s founder, Omar Barghouti, who studied at Tel Aviv University and holds Israeli permanent residence status, does not promote peace or a two-state solution, as seen in his words, “We oppose a Jewish state in any part of Palestine…[only] a sellout Palestinian would accept a Jewish state in Palestine.”[6] That anti-Israel message permeates BDS around the world and ignites its followers on campuses to chant words like “From the River to the Sea,” which most Jewish people see as a call for the elimination of the State of Israel.

BDS appeals to young people on campus by using social justice and human rights rhetoric to spark protests, encampments, and demands to educational institutions for policies that isolate Israel. Dozens of student councils have called on universities to divest from companies who do business with Israel, including terminating study abroad partnerships with Israeli universities.[7] These BDS campaigns create a hostile environment for Jewish students, especially when its advocates apply the language of genocide, apartheid, colonialism, and supremacy to Israel and Jewish people more broadly. While university administrations have met with BDS-supporting campus groups to discuss divestment, very few have formally endorsed their policy demands, with the exception of Union Theological Seminary in New York.[8] As well, many schools have either suspended or banned SJP and Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), a pro-Palestinian Jewish organization, which also serves as a mouthpiece for BDS.[9]

Holding Universities Accountable

Various Jewish groups closely monitor universities for anti-Jewish activity. The ADL has created report cards that rate how colleges combat antisemitism and protect Jewish students from antisemitic and anti-Israel activity. In the most recent 2025 report card, the ADL noted that 45 percent of 135 schools had improved from the previous year, granting eight A grades to schools like Brandeis, the University of Alabama, and Vanderbilt. While most received B’s and C’s, 28 were given D’s, including Columbia, Yale, and Princeton, and 13 received F’s, including the University of California, Santa Barbara, De Paul University, and the University of Minnesota. Despite the progress, Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO of the ADL, sees these grades as unacceptable. “While many campuses have improved in ways that are encouraging and commendable,” Greenblatt said in a statement, “Jewish students still do not feel safe or included on too many campuses.”[10]

Outside of Jewish organizations, US administrations have taken steps to combat antisemitism in society and on college campuses. The Biden administration appointed a special envoy to monitor and combat antisemitism and secured hundreds of millions for security improvements and training to non-profits, including campuses.[11] During his administration, Congress called on the university presidents of Harvard, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the University of Pennsylvania to testify at a hearing about rising antisemitism on their campuses. At the heart of the issue was the concern that free speech had crossed the line into the intimidation of Jewish students. The insufficient responses of the university presidents led to two of their resignations.[12]

The Trump administration’s actions involved an executive order that would combat antisemitism on college campuses, with the Department of Education investigating campuses for antisemitic incidents and the Justice Department creating a task force on antisemitism. The investigations were based on Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination by institutions who receive federal funding.[13] These inquiries led to revoking international student visas, student arrests, and the deportation of more than 1,000 students involved in anti-Israel protests at 174 colleges and universities.[14]Outside of the administrations, Jewish students and organizations have taken legal action, including the Brandeis Center, who is suing Columbia and UCLA.[15]

Yet, these attempts to curtail campus antisemitic activity have found only partial success. In May 2025, more than eighty students with masked faces and keffiyehs (a Bedouin headscarf adopted by the pro-Palestinian movement) stormed Columbia’s Butler library, bellowing chants and defacing shelving. Most of the protesters were arrested, and sixty-five were suspended.[16]Students at other campuses like the University of Washington, Haverford College, and California State have also continued with protests or engaged in hunger strikes.[17]

Still, universities, like Harvard, are working on improving their campus environment for Jewish students. Harvard’s president formed a task force on combatting antisemitism and anti-Israel bias in 2024 and recently issued a 300-plus page report with recommendations on changes to curricula and disciplinary policies.[18] Despite Harvard’s efforts, the Trump administration continues to cut billions in funding to it as well as millions in grants to other universities based on claims of their inability to address antisemitism on campus.[19]

Christian Campus Organizations Addressing Antisemitism

While Jewish groups are working overtime to combat campus antisemitism, Christian campus organizations are starting to assist in the fight. InterVarsity Christian Fellowship wrote a statement, signed by six other campus ministries, declaring racism, antisemitism, and white supremacy as anti-Christian.[20] On a local campus level, some ministry leaders are taking steps to engage Jewish students; InterVarsity at California Polytechnic State University invited Jewish students to one of its small groups, encouraging prayer and discussion.[21] Chosen People Ministries also has a dedicated outreach to Jewish college students through its House of Living Waters program. Young adults live near a major campus, host regular events, and form relationships with Jewish students. House of Living Waters aims to be a light on campuses as they oppose antisemitism and proclaim the gospel.

For Christians not on college campuses but who want to help, Brittany Bertsche, who has worked for Passages, a Christian organization offering trips to Israel, encourages Christians to rally near campuses to support Jewish students and hopes Christian students would lead prayer and worship events.[22] “Shouts of ‘go back to Poland’ or physical assaults on Jewish students should cause us to resoundingly say, ‘Enough is enough,’” wrote Bertsche in an opinion piece. “I want Christians to stand boldly without hesitation against the harm perpetrated against our Jewish brothers and sisters.”[23] It will take a unified effort of Jewish people and Christians on and off campuses to combat the tsunami of hate against Jewish people and Israel that is inundating the globe today, and especially that emanating from American college campuses.