Congressional Investigators ‘Very Concerned’ About Soaring Anti-Semitism at Northwestern

Jewish students have faced ‘intimidation, bigotry, vandalism, and other alleged hate crimes’ in wake of Hamas terror attack

Congressional investigators on a House committee say they are “very concerned” about a flurry of anti-Semitic incidents at Northwestern University that have left Jewish students on campus turning to lawmakers for help.

Like many college campuses across the country, Northwestern has seen an outbreak of “intimidation, bigotry, vandalism, and other alleged hate crimes” aimed at Jewish students in the wake of Hamas’s Oct. 7 terror strike on Israel, according to a report written by students. School administrators, the students say, are failing to stem a rising tide of Jew-hatred on campus, leading them to petition Congress to intervene.

The House Committee on Education and the Workforce—which is already investigating several top American schools for their failure to address anti-Semitism—was provided last week with the detailed report, which outlined a series of escalating events at Northwestern that has endangered Jewish students and left them feeling abandoned by the school’s leadership, the Washington Free Beacon first reported.

A spokesman for the House committee told the Free Beacon that the committee has reviewed the complaint from Northwestern’s Jewish students and is “very concerned” about the findings. This concern could lead the committee, led by Rep. Virginia Foxx (R., N.C.), to include Northwestern in its anti-Semitism probe, which is aimed at unearthing evidence that top schools are ignoring Jew-hatred on campus.

“The committee is very concerned by the reports of antisemitic incidents from students at Northwestern,” the spokesman said. “Institutions allowing or embracing hostility against Jewish students demands scrutiny.”

Michael Rutsky, a student at Northwestern’s Pritzker School of Law who helped assemble the documentation provided to Congress, told the Free Beacon that since students went public with their concerns, the school has attempted to discredit their claims.

“It is great to hear that the committee is concerned about the numerous reports of antisemitic incidents at Northwestern,” Rutsky said. “Unfortunately, it does not feel as though Northwestern is concerned.”

In the time since the Free Beacon reported on their complaint last week, “the school has rebuked our letter, stating that the letter contains ‘numerous inaccuracies and exaggerations,'” Rutsky said.

“Let me be clear,” he added, “no student wants to write a 33-page letter to Congress about anti-Semitism at their school. To hear that our reporting of discrimination and hate speech is met with such indifference from our school is deflating.”

Northwestern did not respond to a Free Beacon request for comment.

Anti-Semitism has “run rampant at Northwestern” since the initial complaint was filed with House investigators, according to Rutsky.

On March 1, for instance, a landmark on Northwestern’s campus was graffitied with the words “Rest in Resistance Aaron Bushnell,” referring to the 25-year-old U.S. serviceman who set himself on fire outside the Israeli embassy in Washington, D.C., to protest alleged “genocide” by Israel.

This week, five Northwestern student law groups are scheduled to host a “Palestine Teach-In” with several professors and supporters of the global movement to economically boycott Israel, according to Rutsky. The event will include Omar Shakir, a supporter of the anti-Semitic Boycott Divestment, and Sanctions movement who works for Human Rights Watch, an NGO also known to promote anti-Israel propaganda.

“There is no end in sight when the school is left to self-policing of accepted behavior,” Rutsky said of the anti-Israel atmosphere on campus. “We respectfully call on the [House] Committee to exercise its oversight powers and investigate Northwestern’s pervasive antisemitism problem.”

An “all out for Palestine” event held in November of last year, a month after Hamas murdered more than 1,200 Jews, featured students who “were proudly photographed posing next to Hamas flags, which were present at the rally and were carried by individuals wearing paramilitary fatigues, similar to those worn by Hamas,” according to the students’ report. During this event, a Jewish student reported “hiding in my apartment” to avoid the anti-Israel mob rallying across campus.

Students also have discovered anti-Semitic flyers on campus, including near their living quarters. One flyer reportedly “pictured a Star of David, images of red blood, and a photo of a child, and was titled ‘Murdered by Israel,'” according to the complaint.