Answer us, Columbia and DA Bragg: Why drop charges for anti-Israel ‘occupiers’?

When Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg last week dropped charges against most of the protesters who seized Hamilton Hall at Columbia University on April 30, the announcement left New York’s Jewish community bewildered and angry.

The Columbia protests, rife with anti-Israel sentiments, exacerbated feelings of insecurity and vulnerability among Jewish students and faculty at Columbia and beyond, leaving deep scars.  

Meanwhile, Bragg’s refusal — claiming a lack of evidence — to pursue criminal consequences for 31 of the 46 protesters charged with trespassing has broadly undermined trust in our legal institutions’ ability to protect and serve all communities fairly.

But several pressing questions for Columbia and Bragg remain.

First, where is the security footage? 

In a world where surveillance cameras and smartphones are ubiquitous, it seems implausible that there was not ample video evidence to support charges against the trespassing protesters — after all, college campuses are typically outfitted with extensive security systems.