As a Columbia Law grad who spent time in biglaw, this is actually kind of surprising. Law firms, to a degree that surprised me, don't really like to jeopardize their reputation with the top law schools (I'm thinking here the top 6, of which Columbia and Harvard are 2).<p>I think there's likely a confluence of factors here[0]:<p>a) Firm might feel clients don't want people who signed the letter to work on their matters (and clients, stupidly and surprisingly, do ask and care about which rando individual associates work on their matters).<p>b) Some people are taking massive license with this latest terrorist attack on Israel to make bold-faced calls for violence and air a lot of bigotry, and large segments of society are letting them get away with it.<p>A lot of people have been dismayed to see criticism of Israel and acknowledgement of its role in exacerbating the conflict becoming more common in general; at the moment, they have the opportunity to silence a lot of dissent on this issue once again, and are only helped by statements as ridiculous and extreme as letters pinning blame on the conflict <i>solely</i> on Israel.<p>c) Big law jobs are shrinking after a period where law firms felt they couldn't get enough elite law talent, and now market power is moving to the firms once again.<p>d) It should be noted that Davis Polk is major prestige and thus less likely to have to give a fuh about reputation among law schools and law students than most law firms. Nobody except the most dedicated partisan is going to boycott Davis Polk over this.<p>In talking to career people at Columbia, there was this assumption that for some of the "lesser" big law firms, such as the one I ended up at, which were lower in both prestige and the number of CLS grads they hired, it was possible for the firm to piss Columbia off and get kicked out of Columbia's OCI and that this would be a bigger L for the firm than for Columbia. Not the case for Davis Polk.<p>[0] I'm not commenting on whether move was reasonable or appropriate. I can make arguments various ways on that issue, personally. I'm just thinking of this more descriptively.