Supporters of the Palestine Solidarity Committee at Harvard University. Photo: Harvard PSC

Davis Polk & Wardwell, a major New York City law firm, said on Tuesday that it had rescinded job offers to three students at Harvard and Columbia universities who signed letters blaming Israel for — and seemingly justifying — Hamas’ invasion of the Jewish state and massacre of Israelis on Oct. 7.

Two of the Columbia students had leadership roles in groups that signed onto a letter released by the Ivy League’s Palestine Solidarity Groups, the New York Times reported.

“These statements are simply contrary to our firms’ values and we thus concluded that rescinding these offers was appropriate in upholding our responsibility to provide a safe and inclusive work environment for all Davis Polk employees,” the firm’s managing partner Neil Barr wrote in an email to staff. “To ensure we continue to maintain a supportive and inclusive work environment, the student leaders responsible for signing on to these statements are no longer welcome in our firm; and their offers of employment have thus been rescinded.”

However, the firm is reportedly reconsidering its decision regarding two of the students, who have protested that they did not authorize or individually endorse the letters.

With its announcement, Davis & Polk joined several business leaders, philanthropic foundations, law firms, and others calling for accountability amid a wave of student support at universities for the invasion of Israel by Hamas, a Palestinian terrorist organization. During its terror onslaught earlier this month, Hamas terrorists took dozens of hostages back to Gaza, including young children and the elderly.

Another law firm, the prominent Chicago-based Winston & Strawn, has rescinded an offer of employment to a law student at New York University who sent a message to the school’s Student Bar Association expressing “absolute solidarity” with the “Palestinian resistance” and blaming Israel for what transpired.

Meanwhile, Bill Ackman, CEO of Pershing Square Capital Management, has demanded the release of names of students whose beliefs align with Hamas’, arguing that Wall Street firms and other companies that hire graduates of prestigious colleges and universities deserve the right to decline employing anyone who supports terrorism.

“One should not be able to hide behind a corporate shield when issuing statements supporting the actions of terrorists, who, we now learn, have beheaded babies, among other inconceivably despicable acts,” Ackman said.

On Monday, meanwhile, the Wexner Foundation, a prominent philanthropic organization, announced that it is terminating a longstanding partnership with Harvard University because of the school’s belated condemnation of Hamas’ terrorist onslaught against Israel and refusal to censure students who expressed support for it.

Since 1989, the foundation’s highly competitive Wexner Israel Fellowship Program has sent 10 Israeli public sector workers each year to the Harvard John F. Kennedy School of Government for a fellowship in which they earn credits toward a master’s degree in public administration. Hundreds of fellows have gone on to enjoy distinguished careers in Israel as lawmakers, military leaders, and government officials.

This year’s class will be the last, according to the Wexner Foundation.

Last week, Harvard University President Claudine Gay said that the members of 31 student groups who signed a statement blaming Israel for Hamas’ terror assault should not be punished, citing the university’s “commitment to free expression.”

Elsewhere in the Ivy League, billionaire Ronald Lauder, a major financial backer of the University of Pennsylvania, threatened on Monday to pull his funding from the school unless it does more to fight antisemitism.

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.