Tarek Bazrouk, of New York City, who is awaiting trial in the U.S. District Court in the Southern District of New York on three hate-crime charges for alleged “repeated assaults” on Jews in 2024 and 2025, has direct ties to Hamas’s so-called military wing, Al-Qassam Brigades, according to the federal charges.
The New York Post reported exclusively on sealed parts of the criminal complaint, which it said alleged that the 20-year-old was a “member of a chat group that received regular updates from Abu Obeida,” the spokesman for the Al-Qassam Brigades. (JNS sought comment from the U.S. Justice Department.)
The defendant, who wasn’t enrolled at Columbia University, attended antisemitic protests on the Manhattan school’s campus in April 2024. The Justice Department has alleged that Bazrouk’s phone was “littered with pro-Hamas and pro-Hezbollah propaganda, showing his support for organizations that have murdered thousands of Jews and Israelis.”
It also said that “antisemitic bias” and “support for anti-Jewish terrorist groups, including Hamas” were found on his phone, and that he allegedly referred to himself as a “Jew-hater,” called Jews “worthless” and asked “Allah” to “get us rid” of Jews. He also told a friend that he was “mad happy” to learn that relatives overseas were members of Hamas, per the Justice Department.
While on Columbia’s campus during the April 2024 protests, he told a friend that he thought of lighting someone on fire and “would’ve” hurt them, but there were “too many” others around for him to act, the Post reported, citing court documents.
A Columbia spokesperson told JNS of Bazrouk, “We have no record of this individual ever being on Columbia’s campus.”
“We want to be clear that this individual is not affiliated with our University in any way,” per the spokesperson, who declined to be named. “Columbia strongly condemns antisemitism and violence, and we are horrified by the violence and hate crimes described in the indictment.”
Bazrouk was arrested on May 7 and charged with three federal hate crimes. He faces up to 30 years in prison for allegedly assaulting Jews outside the New York Stock Exchange on April 15, 2024, near Columbia on Dec. 9, 2024, and in the Gramercy Park neighborhood on Jan. 6.
“The proof is undeniable. Antisemitism on our campuses is out of control—sometimes driven by outside agitators who want to ensure hatred festers and deliberately harm the United States,” the House Committee on Education and the Workforce stated in response to the Post story. “Schools have to do more to stop this kind of hateful antisemitism and protect Jews on campus.”
Robert Holden, a New York City Council member, stated that “this confirms what many of us suspected.”
“These protests weren’t just organic movements. They were infiltrated by individuals with ties to terror groups. It’s disturbing, dangerous and a wake-up call,” he wrote. “The government must treat this as the serious national security threat it is.”
“I wonder how many protesters and professional agitators in Chicago this applies to as well,” wrote Raymond Lopez, a Chicago alderman, tagging the Chicago police, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, and the Chicago offices of the FBI and of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
