Who Is Josh Dubnau?
Josh Dubnau is a tenured professor of anesthesiology and neurobiology at Stony Brook University’s Renaissance School of Medicine (as well as the Director of its Center for Developmental Genetics) whose resume includes a Columbia PhD, senior medical-school roles…and an increasingly public side job as a confrontational activist.
Outside the lab, Dubnau identifies as a socialist, progressive unionist, and member of Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP). His own X biography once described him as “a hemorrhoid in the A$$ of administration” (though he appears to have since removed that element) which is certainly an unusual way for a senior professor and research-center director to present himself.
In recent years, Dubnau’s activism has included multiple arrests, a temporary suspension from Stony Brook, vocal support for Columbia’s encampment movement, a Trump Tower occupation, diploma-burning activism, and a heated anti-Israel protest inside a Hamptons restaurant. His antics have even been picked up by members of Congress, who have asked the very relevant question: why isn’t Stony Brook doing anything about their professor?
Why Was Josh Dubnau Arrested at Stony Brook University?
On May 1st, 2024, Dubnau joined the pro-Palestinian student encampment demonstrations at Stony Brook University. He remained even after police ordered protesters to disperse and was arrested alongside students and another faculty member. Dubnau was charged with disorderly conduct, a noncriminal violation, and News 12 reported the following day that he had been suspended from his job and banned from campus. But the charges were later dropped, and Dubnau returned to his university positions.
He blamed Rick Gatteau, Stony Brook’s Vice President for Student Affairs, and the school’s administration for the arrests involved with the protests: “I think it’s appalling and I think [Gatteau’s] email really was dishonest because he tried to paint the protesters as if they were disruptive in some ongoing activity…the University activity that was happening was that protest, and [Gatteau] violated the code of code of conduct by ending it, by arresting these students. So if anyone was disrupting University activities, it was Rick Gatteau and the other administrators who decided to let the UPD disrupt a peaceful student action.”
His response to concerns about his employment was telling as he discussed his tenured status: “This type of repression does stifle people’s speech unless they feel secure with tenure…It doesn’t take as much bravery for me to speak out because I have a relatively secure position there.”
Nothing says accountability quite like reminding everyone that tenure makes consequences somebody else’s problem.
How Did Josh Dubnau Defend Columbia University’s Encampment?
Dubnau also appeared in media interviews defending the 2024 pro-Palestinian encampments at Columbia University, his alma mater. “I do not feel that this project is anti-Semitic in any way,” he said during an Al Jazeera interview, despite Jewish students testifying to harassment and isolation from the events. He described the student protesters as Jewish, Muslim, Arab, Black, Latino, white, queer, straight, “lovely and kind,” and “on the right side of history.”
That glowing endorsement brushed aside the wider controversy surrounding Columbia’s protest movement, including its support for violent “resistance,” and escalating campus disruption including occupation of university buildings that law enforcement was called in to handle.
But for Dubnau, the encampment was righteous, the protesters were lovely, and concerns about antisemitism barely seemed worth discussing.
Why Was Josh Dubnau (Also) Arrested at Trump Tower?
Dubnau is a member of Jewish Voice for Peace – an anti-Zionist group that posts “The Israeli government’s genocide follows 76 years of its systemic oppression and dehumanization of Palestinians occupation” on the homepage of its website and whose chapters have been suspended from several universities for violation of policy.
In March of 2025, he joined hundreds of other members in the lobby of Trump Tower in Manhattan demanding the release of Columbia activist Mahmoud Khalil. Demonstrators wearing red shirts filled the lobby, displayed banners, chanted, and refused orders to leave. Police arrested nearly 100 participants. The action was promoted as a “Not in Our Name” protest. For Dubnau, it was just another step from public advocacy into deliberately disruptive political theater ending in arrest.
Why Was Josh Dubnau Burning His Own Columbia Diploma?
On May 21st, 2025, Josh Dubnau took another step towards extreme activism when he led Columbia and Barnard alumni to gather outside Columbia’s commencement and tear and burn their diplomas. The protest specifically targeted Columbia’s investments tied to Israel, its supposed treatment of pro-Palestinian activists, and its cooperation with the Trump administration over antisemitism concerns.
Dubnau was one of the protest’s most visible speakers. “There are thousands of us who don’t believe in the right of the Jewish people to ethnically cleanse Palestine,” he declared. “There were Jews thousands of years before Zionism, and there will be Jews when Zionism is in the dustbin of history.”
This went far, far beyond criticizing a specific Israeli political policy. Dubnau painted Jewish national self-determination as an ethnic-cleansing project and predicted Zionism’s eventual destruction, all while helping turn a graduation ceremony into yet another activist spectacle.
How Did Josh Dubnau Escalate Even Further at Lulu’s in the Hamptons?
On July 5th, 2026, Dubnau participated in a protest at Lulu Kitchen & Bar in Sag Harbor over the – Jewish – owner’s support for Israel. Public footage – posted by Dubnau on his own accounts – showed him involved in a heated confrontation connected to the protest, which included passing around mock “genocide menus.”
He later wrote on X: “Half the protesters were Jewish. Your lie that all of us Jews support Israel is antisemitic.”
By using his own Jewish identity to shut down criticism, Dubnau presented anti-Zionist activists as the one, true and authentic voice of Jewish opinion. He has failed to address concerns that have risen about confrontational conduct or answer the question of why a tenured professor keeps showing up at public scenes built around conflict and intimidation.
Why Does Josh Dubnau’s Record Matter at Stony Brook?
Far from being an obscure activist with an anonymous account, Josh Dubnau is a senior professor, medical-school faculty member, and laboratory director at a state university. His activism has repeatedly involved arrests, occupations, disruptive protests, inflammatory speech and statements, and public confrontations.
The issue for Stony Brook is whether tenure should act as permanent immunity when a senior faculty member builds a public pattern of disruptive conduct while openly blaming university administrators. Dubnau appears confident that his position is untouchable. So far, Stony Brook has given him little reason to think otherwise.
