Columbia faces crisis as President's home hit by vandals

In the pre-dawn hours of Friday (March 1), the stately residence of Columbia University’s interim president, Katrina Armstrong, on Morningside Drive became the latest flashpoint in a spiraling confrontation over pro-Palestinian activism and federal intervention. Public safety officers discovered the building defaced at around 12:50 a.m., its facade splattered with red paint and the words "FREE THEM ALL" scrawled in spray paint—a stark message amid protests roiling the campus.

The vandalism, claimed by the student group Columbia University Apartheid Divest (CUAD), follows the arrest of Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on March 8 and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) searches of student residences on March 13, exposing the raw nerves of a university caught between student dissent and a hardening Trump administration stance.

The attack on Armstrong’s home is no isolated outburst. It arrives as Columbia grapples with unrelenting tensions, sparked by Khalil’s detention—a 30-year-old Palestinian-Syrian green card holder and former graduate student accused by the Trump administration of leading activities tied to Hamas, a U.S.-designated terrorist group. Khalil, who earned a master’s degree from Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs in December 2024, had been a prominent figure in CUAD, a coalition of over 100 student organizations pushing for the university to divest from companies linked to Israel. His arrest, executed under what DHS calls President Trump’s executive orders against antisemitism, has galvanized supporters who see it as a politically motivated assault on free speech, while critics argue it reflects a necessary crackdown on radicalism.

CUAD, once spearheaded by Khalil, wasted no time claiming responsibility. Posting photos of the paint-streaked residence on social media, the group dubbed it a “redecoration,” a sardonic jab at Armstrong and Columbia’s leadership. “The people will not stand for @Columbia’s shameless complicity in genocide!” their statement read, accusing the university of abetting Israel’s policies through its investments and silencing dissent via federal collaboration. The red paint, a recurring symbol in their protests, evokes bloodshed—a pointed critique of both Israel’s actions in Gaza and Columbia’s refusal to fully divest. No arrests have been made in the vandalism case, and the NYPD investigation continues, but the act underscores a campus on edge.

Armstrong, who stepped into the interim presidency in August 2024 after Minouche Shafik’s resignation amid earlier protest fallout, has found herself at the helm of a university under siege from multiple fronts. On Thursday, just hours before the vandalism, DHS agents searched student residences on campus—an unprecedented move that Armstrong called “heartbreaking” in a statement, though she stopped short of condemning it outright. The searches, tied to the broader federal probe that ensnared Khalil, have intensified student outrage, with CUAD and its allies decrying what they see as a militarized crackdown. Columbia’s response was measured: a spokesperson condemned the vandalism, noting it had been reported to law enforcement and promising disciplinary action for those involved, but offered no comment on Armstrong’s personal reaction to the attack on her home.

Khalil’s case looms large over this unrest. Born in Syria to Palestinian parents, he worked for the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) and the British Embassy’s Syria office in Lebanon before arriving at Columbia, where he became a vocal advocate for Palestinian liberation. Arrested on March 8 and now detained in a federal facility in Louisiana, he faces deportation—a process temporarily halted by a New York federal judge on March 11 pending a Wednesday conference. DHS claims his activism aligned with Hamas, though no formal charges have been filed, and his lawyers dismiss the accusation as baseless retaliation for his role in protests that rocked Columbia last year. His pregnant American wife and green card status complicate the legal battle, framing it as a test of immigrant rights under Trump’s renewed hardline policies.

The Trump administration is not messing around. On March 9, DHS explained that Khalil’s arrest was “in support of President Trump’s executive orders prohibiting antisemitism,” a stance echoed by Trump himself, who called it the “first of many to come.” The administration’s cancellation of $400 million in Columbia funding last week—ostensibly tied to campus unrest—adds economic pressure to the political fray. Critics, including pro-Israel voices like Columbia professor Shai Davidai, argue Khalil’s actions crossed a line, pointing to CUAD’s past praise for Hamas and Iran’s attacks on Israel. “He wasn’t arrested for speaking up,” Davidai posted on X. “He was arrested for breaking the conditions of his stay here.”

Yet for Khalil’s supporters, the vandalism and protests reflect a deeper moral stand. CUAD’s rhetoric—once focused on divestment—has sharpened into calls for “the total eradication of Western civilization,” a stance that alarms detractors. The group’s October 2024 apology for retracting criticism of a student’s violent rhetoric, coupled with its endorsement of armed resistance, has only fueled the divide. Jewish students, meanwhile, report feeling increasingly targeted, with Columbia’s Task Force on Antisemitism documenting harassment incidents in a recent report—a tension Armstrong has vowed to address but struggled (or worse, not even bothered) to contain.

As police hunt the vandals and Khalil’s fate hangs in the balance, Columbia stands at a crossroads: Armstrong’s tenure, barely seven months old, facing a crucible: balancing student safety and fighting the rising tides of antisemitism, when many in the student body seem incapable of squashing their blatant vicious Jew hatred.