Two Barnard College students have been expelled more than a month after masked anti-Israel protesters stormed a Columbia University class about the Jewish state’s history and flung hate-filled flyers around.
The students, who haven’t been publicly identified, had already been slapped with suspensions in the wake of the Jan. 21 caught-on-camera saga that erupted when keffiyeh-clad agitators barged into the “History of Modern Israel” class on the first day of the semester at the Ivy League campus.
They were officially thrown out on Friday following a probe, according to Columbia’s Apartheid Divest — a student-led anti-Israel group.
“When rules are broken, when there is no remorse, no reflection, and no willingness to change, we must act,” Barnard College president Laura Rosenbury told The Post in a statement, noting she couldn’t comment directly on a student’s disciplinary record, citing federal law.
“Expulsion is always an extraordinary measure, but so too is our commitment to respect, inclusion, and the integrity of the academic experience.
“At Barnard, we always fiercely defend our values. At Barnard, we always reject harassment and discrimination in all forms. And at Barnard, we always do what is right, not what is easy,” Rosenbury added.
The action comes weeks after the group of rowdy rabble-rousers were filmed entering the classroom and distributing pamphlets to students, including one depicting a boot stamping on a Star of David and another with the Israeli flag on fire and the words “Burn Zionism to the ground.”
Footage of the commotion showed some students begging the protesters to get out as one peeved pupil crumpled up a flyer and defiantly declared, “We don’t want your s–t.”
“Take off your mask,” one peer could be heard urging the agitators. “Why don’t you take off your mask?”
“This is a civil rights violation, we’re trying to learn,” another said.
Interim Columbia president Katrina Armstrong denounced the disruption at the time, vowing to investigate those responsible.
Still, one of the expelled students claimed the disciplinary action was baseless, according to a statement put out by Apartheid Divest.
“[At Barnard], I was told countless times the value of voicing my opinion and standing up for what I know to be true and good,” the unnamed student griped.
“The fact that my removal has taken place so baselessly, simply because I believe that a Holocaust of the Palestinian people is unequivocally wrong has completely shattered the illusion of what I thought Barnard stood for.”
Apartheid Divest, meanwhile, doubled down in the wake of the expulsions – blasting out footage of the initial incident on social media as they boasted: “We disrupted a Zionist class, and you should too.”
Columbia/Barnard Hillel’s executive director, Brian Cohen, applauded Barnard for expelling the students but called on Columbia to do the same for its own.
“When students have their right to get an education trampled on by masked protesters who burst into their classroom, those protestors need to be held accountable,” he said in a statement.
“We applaud Barnard College for taking decisive action, and hope Columbia follows suit with the other perpetrators who have infringed on student rights in the past year — from the encampments to the takeover of Hamilton Hall.
This will send a clear message that the harassment of Jewish students and faculty will not be tolerated at Columbia,” he added.
The disruption unfolded after Columbia students, with the help of faculty and outside agitators not associated with the university, staged a tent encampment on the Upper Manhattan campus last year that at times descended into chaos.
The elite institution has been roiled by anti-Israel demonstrations ever since the Oct. 7, 2023, bloodshed at the hands of Hamas terrorists.
