House committee launches antisemitism investigation into Rutgers University

The House Education and Workforce Committee launched an antisemitism investigation into Rutgers University on Wednesday, citing the school’s “failure to protect Jewish students.”

Committee Chairwoman Virginia Foxx (R-NC) sent a letter to six members of Rutgers senior leadership detailing allegedly antisemitic incidents and requesting documents related to communications, disciplinary action, and procedures involving antisemitism on campus.

Rutgers is now the fifth school in the country to be the target of the committee’s widening antisemitism inquiry of universities.

“I have grave concerns regarding the inadequacy of Rutgers’ response to antisemitism on its campuses,” Foxx wrote in the letter. “Rutgers stands out for the intensity and pervasiveness of antisemitism on its campuses. Rutgers senior administrators, faculty, staff, academic departments and centers, and student organizations have contributed to the development of a pervasive climate of antisemitism.”

Foxx highlighted a “pattern of deeply troubling incidents” that have taken place at the school, including some involving the Rutgers-Newark Center for Security, Race and Rights, which the letter claims has become “a hotbed of radical antisemitic, anti-American, anti-Israel, and pro-terrorist activity.”

According to the letter, CSRR’s director, Sahar Aziz and, others at the center have a history of antisemitic activity, including “justif[ying] the October 7, 2023, terrorist attack against Israel in an October 31 tweet, stating, ‘To assess Hamas’s October 7th operation and the Israeli regime’s subsequent response in isolation is to ignore over 75 years of colonial violence and the horrific consequences born out of these decades of oppression and attempted erasure.’”

Aziz is scheduled to speak at Cornell University on a panel on Thursday titled “Racializing Religion: Islamophobia, Antisemitism and Palestine.”

The center also hosted former University of South Florida professor Sami al Arian in 2021 for a 9/11 anniversary event that “challenges the exceptionalization of 9/11/2001; legitimization of ‘war on terror’ and other imperialist wars and interventions; justification of the ‘Security’ State, and promotion of hyper masculinity and a colonial gender and sexualized order of modernization and ‘civilization.’” Al Arian pleaded guilty and was convicted of “providing material support to the designated terrorist group Palestinian Islamic Jihad,” according to the letter.

The letter also cited other examples, such as administrators from Rutgers Law School opening disciplinary proceedings against a Jewish student for challenging allegedly antisemitic messages in a Student Bar Association group chat, as well as the school’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine, which has allegedly harassed students and disrupted learning and campus life while receiving tens of thousands of dollars from student government.

Foxx pointed to Feb. 29 testimony from Rutgers student Joe Gindi, who spoke about the campus climate of antisemitism.

“Jew hatred has become rampant at Rutgers University. And it has become clear that some members of the school’s administration and faculty are complicit in allowing, and even in encouraging, this hate to grow,” Gindi said, adding, “At Rutgers University, like at many other campuses, there appears to be selective enforcement of [university] rules. They just don’t seem to apply when it comes to protecting Jewish students.”

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As the investigations into campus antisemitism continue, several academics are scheduled to provide testimony to the committee, including officials from Columbia University who are set to testify in mid-April.

The Washington Examiner reached out to Rutgers for comment.