Columbia University alumnus snubs alma mater, donates $260M to Israeli university
NY Post
A Columbia alumnus snubbed his alma mater and anonymously donated a staggering $260 million of his fortune to one of Israel’s largest universities.
Bar-Ilan, the public research university that is getting the gift, described the philanthropist as a “North American Jew and graduate of Columbia University who was active in World War II.”
It said Monday that the donor sees Bar-Ilan as “best able to undertake the great task of expanding science-based technological resilience in Israel.”
The Columbia alum’s massive donation to a major academic institution in the Jewish state fueled speculation that he was upset with the anti-Israel and antisemitic protests that have engulfed the uptown Ivy League university amid the Israel-Hamas war.
The donor, while remaining anonymous, wanted it known that he was a Columbia graduate.
“It’s a smack in the face of Columbia. It’s just the beginning,” Hank Sheinkopf, a longtime political consultant, pro-Israel activist and rabbi, told The Post.
