Dr. Charles Asher Small, Executive Director of the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP), testified last Thursday before the US Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) in a hearing titled “Antisemitic Disruptions on Campus: Ensuring Safe Learning Environments for All Students.”
The hearing, led by Chairman Senator Bill Cassidy (R-LA), marked a pivotal moment of bipartisan attention to the escalating threats faced by Jewish students in higher education.
Dr. Small’s testimony included details of ISGAP’s findings, showing that Texas A&M received over $1 billion from Qatar, Cornell nearly $10 billion, and Columbia University at least $7.17 million—none of which was fully disclosed to the US Department of Education, violating federal law. He also pointed to Qatari support for satellite campuses, like those in Doha’s “Education City,” where US university research intellectual property is contractually assigned to the Qatari government.
“Our research has also exposed the strategic use of third-party foundations, institutes, and businesses to conceal the identities of foreign donors,” Dr. Small said. “Universities fail to disclose the terms of foreign donations that may compromise academic independence and integrity. When foreign regimes use American universities to promote their ideologies, and those institutions accept this funding without transparency or accountability, we are complicit in undermining our democratic values.”
He called on lawmakers to enforce transparency laws for foreign donations, investigate universities receiving authoritarian funding, adopt the IHRA Working Definition of Antisemitism, and fully enforce Title VI protections to safeguard Jewish students. Dr. Small also stressed the need for comprehensive programs to critically study contemporary antisemitism.
Dr. Small was joined by a panel of witnesses, including Carly Gammill, Director of Legal Policy at StandWithUs; Rabbi Levi Shemtov, Executive Vice President of American Friends of Lubavitch (Chabad); Rabbi David Saperstein, Director Emeritus of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism; and Kenneth Stern, Director of the Bard Center for the Study of Hate. Together, they presented compelling evidence of an increasingly hostile campus climate where Jewish students face harassment, intimidation, and exclusion for expressing their identity or supporting Israel.
In his testimony, Dr. Small presented findings from ISGAP’s “Follow the Money” initiative, which highlights a direct link between foreign authoritarian funding—particularly from Qatar—and the rise in antisemitism on U.S. college campuses. ISGAP’s analysis reveals that universities receiving funding from authoritarian regimes, including those from the Middle East, report 300% more antisemitic incidents than institutions that do not accept such funding.
Dr. Small explained that Qatari funding has skewed campus discussions, undermined academic freedom, and created environments where antisemitism is not only tolerated but sometimes encouraged: “ISGAP’s research has shown that donations from Qatar have significantly influenced antisemitic discourse and campus politics in US universities, while also promoting anti-democratic values within these educational institutions. Following the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, these influences have raised serious security concerns with both domestic and global implications.”
