Following an executive order, U.S. President Donald Trump has cut funding to several universities to combat campus antisemitism.

”In Europe, funding of universities is usually done by public procurement. It is done in a proper order and there is no one single Head of State that can simply stop or change the funding. There are procedures that need to be kept,’’ says Katharina von Scnurbein, in charge within the EU Commission of combating antisemitism.

Since taking office, U.S. President Trump’s administration has decided to cut funding American universities in the wake of its campaign to combat campus antisemitism in the framework of pro-Palestinian activities.

Following Trump’s executive order, the U.S. Education Department has canceled grants to Culumbia and Harvard “under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act.” Title VI prohibits discrimination based on race, color or national origin in federally funded institutions. Since 2004, the Department of Education has extended Title VI protections to Jews, Muslims and other religious groups that “face discrimination on the basis of shared ethnic characteristics.

“The Department is putting universities, colleges, and K-12 schools on notice: this administration will not tolerate continued institutional indifference to the wellbeing of Jewish students on American campuses, nor will it stand by idly if universities fail to combat Jew hatred and the unlawful harassment and violence it animates,” said Craig Trainor, acting Assistant Secretary for civil rights, in a statement.

The US government has also threatened to ban Harvard University from enrolling foreign students after the institution said it would not bow to demands from President Donald Trump’s administration and was hit with a funding freeze.

The White House has demanded Harvard make changes to hiring, admissions and teaching practices to help fight antisemitism on campus.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has asked for records on what she called the “illegal and violent” activities of its foreign student visa-holders.

The Department of Education has been instructed to create e a report on current activities and investigations surrounding antisemitism on campuses so that the U.S. Ppresident can give further directions on how to move forward.

Can the Trump administration’s response to antisemitism on U.S. campuses be adopted in Europe ?

‘’We saw the executive order of President Trump. He hasac very wide ranging power to do so, this includes financing universities and treating the perpetrators of antisemitic activities and also the response with regard to collecting the data of incidents,’’ noted Katharina von Schnurbein, the European Commission’s Coordinator in charge of Combating Antisemitism.

‘’With regards to the financing of universities we in Europe are in a very different situation,’’ she added in an interview with Radio Judaica in Brussels.

‘’In Europe, funding is usually done by public procurement. It is done in a proper order and there is no one single Head of State that can simply stop or change the funding. There are procedures that need to be kept,’’ she explained.

The second aspect is with regards to the student body. ‘’If we look for example at Columbia University, 55 % of the students are international students. That’s a big number and has to do with the financing of the university that has also to pay significantly in general. Students have to pay very high fee to go to Columbia University. If we compare this with Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB, Brussels Free University) for example, which is roughly the same in size, 34,000 students in Columbia, 37,000 at ULB, we have 33% of international students and of those 20% are coming from EU countries

‘’So they have EU passports. This is not simple to say: we extradite perpetrators that dont’ have Belgian nationality for example,’’ von Schnurbein added.

‘’However, where we can see similarities is the reporting of incidents and making these incidents public. This is not only the case of antisemitic incidents but it should bet he case for any hate incident including also hate speech and hateful behavior. And here I think we have room for maneuver. There should be reporting structures in universities,’’ she said.

The European Commission, she mentioned, has proposed, as part of its policy, that every institution, also civil society organisations, universitues, schools, businesses, churches, ‘’should have protocols in place as to what happens when an antisemitic incident happens within the institution. Who has to be informed ? Who takes decisions ? Who takes care of the victims ?’’

‘’These are really important aspects. An dit is not difficult to define. It’s like a fire drill. You need to have the structures in place in order to react when something happens. And there we can see similarities with the U.S.,’’ she said.

Von Schnurbein also recognizes the importance of the need to record incidents that are below the hate crime threshold. ‘’Antisemitism doesnt start with hate crime. We have forms of antisemitism that are lawful but awful. They are covered by freedom of speech but they create an atmosphere in which life for Jews is very complicated. And in many cases that’s what we have seen in many universities. It’s fully unacceptable and I thiank this is where universities have to act.’’

‘’We have a definition by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) that defines this contemporary form of antisemitism, including Israel-related antisemitism which often is not necessarily illegal but creates this atmosphere which we don’t want in our universities.’’

She concluded by saying that Universities should be places ‘’where we have debate and exchange but also where every student should feel safe and have access to education.’’

‘’The fact that we see a situations at the moment in Europe where Jews have to hide their identity, to think twice as to whether they go to campus because of security reasons or simply because of the atmosphere is unacceptable and is contrary to what university should be.’’