Justice Dept official says she authorized probe of University of Washington response to Jew-hatred
Harmeet Dhillon, assistant U.S. attorney general for civil rights, said on Monday that she authorized the department to open a civil rights investigation of the University of Washington, a public school in Seattle, for its response to Jew-hatred on campus.
Dhillon stated that a student group, Students United for Palestinian Equality and Return (SUPER) UW, plans to hold a fundraising event for the “Lebanese resistance.” The group “has a history of violent antisemitic activity on University of Washington’s campus,” she stated.
It wasn’t clear if the department had opened the probe or intended to do so.
The event, scheduled for Tuesday, is a “fundraiser for Lebanon” organized by the group with the Seattle University chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine and the Seattle Palestine Action Network. It is slated to include a screening of “The Last Sky,” a film billed as “a groundbreaking new documentary about the Gazan genocide.”
“With the recent escalated attacks on Lebanon, it is a crucial time to raise funds to materially support as well as deepen our understandings of the Lebanese resistance,” the groups stated.
University of Washington has stated publicly often that SUPER UW’s recognition “was permanently revoked in May of last year and applications for reinstatement will not be considered.”
Thirty-three people associated with SUPER UW face charges related to $1 million in damage to a university engineering building during a protest calling on University of Washington to divest from Israel.
Members of the group participated in a protest that turned violent Sunday night outside a StandWithUs Northwest event at Town Hall in Seattle, SUPER UW said on Instagram.
The news comes weeks after Robert Jones, president of University of Washington, held a town hall at a frum shul on combating Jew-hatred on campus.
