The president of Columbia University in New York is stepping down

The president of the prestigious Columbia University in New York, Minouche Shafik, announced her resignation on Wednesday, August 14, announcing the “time of crisis” when the establishment came the center of student protests against the war in Gaza. “I am making this announcement now so that new management is in place by the start of next semester”she wrote in a message carried by Columbia’s student newspaper.

The university, which she has headed since July 2023, was one of the first to advance at the beginning of Israel’s war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip, in response to the bloody attack by the Palestinian movement on the his soil on October 7. There were activists and students cleared by the army on April 30 by riot police and the usual big graduation ceremony was cancelled. Since then, most students have left campus for the summer vacation.

The private university was accused on the one hand of not having fought strongly enough against anti-Semitism, and on the other hand, of being too heavy-handed against anti-Palestinian student groups with to require the order force to intervene. Widely criticized for calling the police, President Minouche Shafik, an American economist of Egyptian origin, was interviewed by Congress along with other university presidents, accused of failing to protect Jewish students. enough

“Over the summer, I was able to think and decided that my resignation would allow Columbia to better face the challenges it faces. »

Minouche Shafik

During this “time of crisis”it was “difficult to overcome different opinions within our community”she writes. “Over the summer, I was able to think and decided that my resignation would allow Columbia to better face the challenges it faces.” She says she is “He tried to treat everyone with fairness and compassion” and claims that the “threats” which her colleagues, her students and herself were particularly subject to “painful” to live

Before Minouche Shafik, president of the University of Pennsylvania, Elizabeth Magill, and her Harvard colleague, Claudine Gayresigned in connection with the conflict, in December and January respectively.