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Who Funnels Billions into U.S. Universities?

February 17, 2026

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Qatar, Charities and Campus Activists Fuel Dangerous Lies

Qatar Funds American Universities and Promotes Hate

The Qatari government contributed $1.1 billion in funding to American universities in 2025, according to new U.S. Dept. of Education data. Over the years, it has provided nearly $8 billion – easily topping the list of foreign funding. The largest recipients of funding were Cornell Univ. and Carnegie Mellon Univ. – both universities have campuses in the Middle East country of Qatar.

“Qatar and its affiliates could be a source of antisemitic influence upon Carnegie Mellon” because significant amounts of money could “motivate the university to abide by expectations and wishes of its generous donors.” wrote U.S. District Judge W. Scott Hardy in a recent legal opinion. Former student Yael Canaan is suing the university for “pervasive anti-Jewish discrimination.”

The Islamic country is a small but very wealthy Gulf monarchy located on the Arabian Peninsula neighboring Saudi Arabia, and not part of the United Arab Emirates. It hosts the largest U.S. military base in the Middle East and is considered a controversial American security partner. U.S. Sen. John Cornyn recently stated that Qatar is “problematic” and playing both sides.

Qatar has publicly portrayed itself as a ‘moderate’ country. Its leader described his country’s bid to host the 2036 Olympics as a “platform for promoting peace.” At the same time, its K-12 textbooks condemn Christianity and Judaism as “corrupted,” call polytheistic religions – like Hinduism – “ignorant” and label all non-Muslims as “infidels.”

The Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education concluded that the Islamic country’s “educational materials contradict Qatar’s policies and public statements combatting intolerance and hatred through education.”

Al Jazeera is a media organization founded and funded by the Qatari government that routinely promotes anti-American and anti-Israel propaganda. Its recent Al Jazeera Forum provided a platform for Iran-backed Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal – who lives in Qatar. U.S. Sen. Ted Budd called on Qatar to extradite Mashaal to the U.S. because he has the “blood of Americans on his hands.”

Well-Known Charities Validate Lies: Hamas Hospitals

Doctors Without Borders recently announced that it had stopped providing services at Gaza’s largest hospital – weeks after it suspended operations. The NGO said its teams at Nasser Hospital reported “the presence of armed men, intimidation, arbitrary arrests of patients and suspected weapons movement.” This statement confirmed what Israel had stated for years – and was firmly rejected by NGOs, world government and pro-Palestinian activists.

Palestinian American activist Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib – who also has harshly criticized Israel – called this: “The Great Hospital Con.” He stated that “any child in Gaza could have told Doctors Without Borders, The New York Times and Al Jazeera, if they had bothered to ask whether Hamas literally turned Gaza’s three main hospitals into its headquarters.” Instead, charities and news organizations condemned Israel for targeting Hamas terrorists who used Gaza hospitals to launch attacks.

Hamas recruited 80 individuals from 60 international agencies, according to NGO Monitor. The watchdog group reported that Hamas turned hospitals into military assets with NGO compliance. The Palestinian terror group described Gaza medical facilities as “gathering places for commanders in times of escalation.” The Gaza director of Catholic Relief Services – the official international humanitarian agency of Catholics in the U.S. – was associated with another Palestinian terror group.

Well-Known Charities Validate Lies: Genocide and Apartheid

Amnesty International is one of several humanitarian groups that have falsely accused Israel of committing genocide, ethnic cleansing and apartheid – even before Oct. 7. Amnesty admitted that it weakened its criteria for the definition of genocide – lowering the standard required to justify the accusation. Under its altered definition, Israel meets Amnesty’s genocide criteria. It made a similar change to the standard for apartheid.

These false labels applied to Israel are then promoted and recycled by other groups, news organizations and antizionist activists. Major NGOs also have relied on Hamas lies and propaganda to promote modern day blood libels of Israel intentionally targeting civilians in Gaza and causing widespread famine. Former Oxfam UK CEO Halima Begum – a Bangladeshi British Muslim – is suing the global poverty charity for antisemitism, racism and sexism and stated that the group promoted the “genocide” claim without proper evidence and legal advice.

Qatar’s primary broadcaster, Al Jazeera, has “served as a propaganda arm of Hamas and had full cooperation from the organization, benefiting both parties,” according to The Institute for National Security Studies. The INSS report, From Jihad to Justice: Hamas’s Outreach to the International Arena, documented how Hamas used human rights language, manipulated the media and used universal morals to adapt its Islamic rhetoric to appeal to Western audiences.

Campus Activists Parrot Hamas and NGO Narratives

Students for Justice in Palestine – at the City Univ. of New York Law School – is hosting an event about the Hamas terror tunnels. Columbia Univ. earth and environmental sciences researcher Hadeel Assali will lead a discussion on The Underground in Gaza: “This anthropologic investigation will examine the history and usage of tunnels in Gaza, focusing on land use and social organization in resistance to colonization.”

“Resistance” is a codeword for terrorism and “colonization” is used to describe the existence of Israel – the ancestral homeland of the Jewish people. The Iran-backed Palestinian terror group hid and murdered many hostages in its tunnels – including Israeli American Hersh Goldberg-Polin – but educating about the horrors of what happened in the tunnels is not the purpose of the event.

Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine (FSJP) were implicated for promoting anti-Jewish hatred at the Univ. of California system, according to a new AMCHA Initiative report. FSJP provided resources for promoting an agenda against speakers, programs and perspectives identified as Zionists – by treating them as “illegitimate.” They also coordinated “faculty messaging and academic programming” across the university system. The report concluded that the UC system’s actions “predictably produced hostility, exclusion and targeting of affected students.”

The Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law has filed a complaint against several professional groups – including National Students for Justice in Palestine and Faculty for Justice in Palestine Network – alleging they helped coordinate and finance the violent encampment at UCLA in 2024 that included a “Jew exclusion zone.” A separate Brandeis Center lawsuit against Columbia Univ. alleges that outside organizations – including the pro-Hamas People’s Forum – played a central role in organizing, funding and directing campus actions that resulted in violence, intimidation and property damage.

A recent incident proves what can happen when universities fail to act. Antizionist activists at Haverford College near Philadelphia interrupted a lecture by an Israeli journalist on “The Myth of Settler Colonialism.” A witness described how a person with a face-covering “opened the emergency exit, and snuck in a group of maybe five people, all wearing the same full-face coverings.” When Professor Barak Mendelsohn first saw the masked protesters, he thought that there was “a bunch of terrorists trying to get in and kill us.” The university did not provide adequate security for the event.

  1. Qatar funding of American universities is disturbing: Qatar is the largest foreign donor to American universities – contributing billions of dollars over the past two decades. This funding is not neutral philanthropy. It comes from a foreign monarchy that hosts Hamas leaders, suppresses dissent at home and actively promotes anti-Western narratives through its state media. When American universities accept these funds, they risk importing foreign propaganda into classrooms that shape public opinion and influence future leaders.
  2. Qatari textbooks promote hate not peace: While Qatar presents itself internationally as a “moderate” partner promoting peace, its own government-approved textbooks tell a different story. Educational materials used in Qatari K-12 schools condemn Judaism and Christianity as “corrupted,” label non-Muslims as “infidels” and promote religious intolerance. This contradiction exposes the gap between Qatar’s public narrative and its actual values – raising serious questions about its influence abroad and credibility as a global partner.
  3. International charities work with Hamas to promote lies: Trusted humanitarian organizations have amplified false Hamas narratives that shaped global coverage and perceptions about the Gaza war. Many NGOs dismissed years of evidence about Hamas using hospitals for military purposes – only for Doctors Without Borders recently confirmed an armed presence at the largest Gaza hospital. By repeating unverified claims and redefining legal terms to single out Israel, these organizations help legitimize disinformation that fuels antisemitism and places Jews at greater risk worldwide.
  4. Campus activism that amplifies terrorist propaganda is unacceptable: Activist students, professors and groups on university campuses around the world increasingly echo narratives promoted by Hamas, NGOs and manipulated media agencies. Terror tunnels are reframed as environmental “land use” and violence against civilians is relabeled as “resistance.” This is not an academic subject – it is moral perversion. When terrorism is repackaged as justice, universities stop being centers of learning and become platforms for radicalization and intimidation.
  5. Antizionist activism is not grassroots community organizing: Much of today’s activism against the Jewish state reflects narratives promoted by foreign governments, amplified by NGOs and legitimized by sympathetic media and academic networks. When the same slogans are chanted simultaneously on city streets, campuses and social media around the world, it points to high level coordination and funding – not spontaneous, grassroots support.
  6. Selective outrage exposes political bias: Campus activists who mobilize aggressively and loudly against Israel have been largely silent about the mass murders in Iran, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Hamas atrocities against Palestinians. This selective outrage reveals bias against Jews and Israel, not a genuine concern for human rights. When only one country and one people – the Jewish state and Jewish people – are singled out for condemnation, activism crosses the line from advocacy into outright discrimination.

Everyone has a responsibility to push back against disinformation.

  • Question the source, not just the claim: When you see extreme accusations about Israel or Jews, pause and ask: who is funding this message, who benefits from it and why it is being amplified now? Disinformation is rarely spontaneous and succeeds by provoking outrage before facts can be checked. Be skeptical of claims designed to shock or inflame – especially those relying on recycled NGO reports, anonymous sources or social media posts.
  • Call out selective outrage: Speak up when activists or organizations single out Israel while remaining silent on Iran’s repression, Russia’s war in Ukraine or Hamas atrocities. Human rights should not depend on who the victims are but should apply universally.
  • Demand accountability in education and public institutions: Require universities, schools and civic leaders to uphold standards of inquiry, balance and transparency. There have been too many examples of biased programming, activist “scholarship” and one-sided events. Schools should promote critical thinking, not serve as platforms for foreign-funded propaganda or intimidation.

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This content is developed by The Focus Project in partnership with MERCAZ USA. The Focus Project distributes weekly news and talking points on timely issues concerning Israel and the Jewish people, including antisemitism, anti-Zionism and the delegitimization of Israel. It represents a consensus view across a spectrum of major American Jewish organizations. MERCAZ USA recognizes and respects the diversity of views on these issues among its readers and the community at large.

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