SJP’s Antisemitism on Full Display at Sarah Lawrence College

A recent event at Sarah Lawrence College featuring liberal journalist Ezra Klein was deliberately disrupted by student protesters who sought not merely to express dissent, but also to intimidate attendees and prevent the speaker from being heard. At the same time, an antisemitic slur—referring to Klein as a “Zionist Pig”—was painted on a prominently located campus free-expression board. These incidents followed days of visible agitation and organizing surrounding Klein’s visit.

The disruption was not symbolic or incidental. Masked protesters positioned themselves directly outside the auditorium doors, confronting audience members as they entered. They held a huge signs at the audience with the word “Nazi” and they chanted, “Sarah Lawrence, we know you; you protect Zionist Jews.” The chants were not aimed solely at the speaker. They were directed at Jewish students, faculty and others attempting to attend a campus event without harassment. The message was unmistakable: Participation itself marked one as illegitimate.

The protesters’ intent was not to persuade but to deter. Their physical placement at entry points, their attempts at anonymity with masks, and their language all served to heighten intimidation. This was not protest at a distance. It was targeted confrontation designed to make participation in a school event uncomfortable or unsafe. The targeting of attendees rather than arguments—of “Zionist Jews” rather than ideas—is the defining feature of collective punishment, not political protest.

Throughout this, Sarah Lawrence’s president, Cristle Collins Judd, was physically present on stage. She did not intervene as protesters crowded outside the lecture hall, chanted hate at attendees, and created an atmosphere of intimidation. She did not pause the event, address the conduct as it unfolded, or attempt to enforce institutional boundaries in real time. No appreciable visible security was present to manage the situation or protect those entering the auditorium. When the large number of protesters eventually dispersed from the auditorium, Judd turned to Klein onstage and said, “Welcome to Sarah Lawrence College.”

Klein himself attempted engagement. From the stage, he invited protesters to remain and participate in discussion. Rather than accept that invitation in earnest, the protesters—affiliated with Students for Justice in Palestine—left after a perfunctory exchange. The disruption was not a failed attempt at dialogue; it was a refusal of dialogue.

The following day, Judd sent a campus-wide email addressing both incidents. She explicitly identified the slur as antisemitic, acknowledged that the disruptions created an atmosphere of intimidation, and stated clearly that such conduct interfered with the audience’s ability to hear and engage with the speaker. She reaffirmed that intimidation and dehumanization cannot be condoned and referred the incidents for investigation under the College’s conduct process.

That statement mattered. It articulated institutional norms and drew an important distinction between protest and intimidation. But what followed made clear that those norms were being openly rejected.

In a public statement issued on Jan. 29 on Instagram, Students for Justice in Palestine responded to the president’s email not by acknowledging those boundaries, but by attacking them outright. The group asserted that Klein’s talk “necessitated disruption,” describing him as “an apologist of white supremacist views and an accessory to genocidal state violence,” and declaring it their “obligation as people of conscience … to not allow the platforming of racist political pundits to go on unchecked.”

The statement went further, insisting that, “Disruptive as it was, the protest was neither violent nor did it violate safety standards, college policies, or ‘infringe on the rights of others’ in any way.” It accused Judd of “blatant lies wielded to vilify students and manufacture consent for disciplinary charges,” dismissed the antisemitic slur on the free-expression board as “equally ludicrous,” and claimed the administration was seeking to “suppress dissent against Zionism and imperialism at any cost.”

The claim that blocking access, chanting at attendees, and forcing a speaker off meaningful engagement does not “infringe on the rights of others” reflects a worldview in which only certain people are understood to have rights at all.

In a separate slide, SJP warned that if the administration “carries out her threat to bring conduct charges against any peaceful student protestors, we are prepared to contest that effort and protect our students,” concluding with the slogan: “Hands off students. Free Palestine.”

These are not the words of a group seeking clarification or dialogue. They are an explicit rejection of the College’s authority to enforce basic norms of academic life. The statement asserts a unilateral right to disrupt events, denies that intimidation can infringe on others’ rights, and treats disciplinary review itself as illegitimate repression.

For Jewish students, the implications were unmistakable. Many attended expecting the College to provide the basic conditions of safety and order it routinely promises. Instead, they encountered targeted chants, blocked entrances, and an administration unwilling to intervene in real time. They were later told that intimidation had occurred, but only after it had already succeeded.

Jewish students are often told that discomfort is part of political life. What occurred here was not discomfort. Students shared with me that they were deeply concerned for their safety and believe that violence was imminent. What happened was unambiguous: another clear and dangerous case of institutional failure to protect students’ equal access to academic life.

Leadership is not measured by the clarity of statements issued after norms collapse, but by whether those norms are enforced when they are challenged. In this case, disruption was foreseeable, authority was tested, and enforcement was deferred.

Leadership is not measured by the clarity of statements issued after norms collapse, but by whether those norms are enforced when they are challenged.

This was not a failure of foresight. It was a refusal to lead when leadership carried a cost, and the consequences of that refusal now extend beyond a single event to the credibility of the institution itself.

What makes this episode especially clarifying is how little it ultimately had to do with Israel, policy, or geopolitical disagreement. Klein has been openly critical of Israel and of successive Israeli governments for years. He was not targeted because of a particular argument made onstage that night. He was targeted because he could be reduced to a caricature (“Zionist,” “white supremacist,” “genocide apologist”)—labels deployed not to debate ideas, but to delegitimize a Jewish speaker and justify his silencing.

That same logic was extended to the broader Jewish community at Sarah Lawrence. The chants directed at attendees, the dismissal of an antisemitic slur as “ludicrous,” and the insistence that intimidation does not infringe on others’ rights all follow a familiar pattern. Jews are told that their exclusion is deserved, that their fear is fabricated, and that any attempt to name what is happening is itself an act of bad faith. Historically, antisemitism has often relied not on explicit hatred alone, but also on moral narratives that recast the exclusion of Jews as ethical necessity.

Historically, antisemitism has often relied not on explicit hatred alone, but also on moral narratives that recast the exclusion of Jews as ethical necessity.

This is not political protest. It is a tactic of degradation and is evil.

When a group asserts a moral right to disrupt, denies that harassment can cause harm, and portrays enforcement as illegitimate repression, it is not advancing a cause. It is asserting dominance. The purpose is not persuasion, but intimidation; it is not speech, but silencing. The target is not a viewpoint, but a community.

It’s crucial to call this what it is: pure hate toward Jewish Zionists. Antisemitism does not always arrive draped in ancient symbols or explicit slurs and imagery. It often appears in modern language—in claims that Jews uniquely deserve exclusion, that Jewish presence is provocation, and that Jewish safety is a negotiable inconvenience. What unfolded at Sarah Lawrence reflects that reality in a clear and raw form and asserts that Jewish Zionists are not human.

Institutions exist precisely to draw lines against this kind of behavior. They exist to ensure that disagreement does not become dehumanization and that protest does not become persecution. When those lines are not enforced—especially when warning signs are clear—the result is not pluralism, but permission.

This was not about Israel. It was not about politics. It was about whether Jewish students are entitled to the same dignity, safety, humanity and participation as everyone else. On that question, Sarah Lawrence’s leadership hesitated and only reacted once the protests became public and they were forced to act. When institutions treat the intimidation and dehumanization of Jews as a debatable political tactic rather than an enforceable moral boundary, antisemitism does not merely appear on campus—it is empowered.

Samuel J. Abrams is a professor of politics at Sarah Lawrence College and a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.