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The House committee launches an anti-Semitism investigation into Northwestern

Northwestern is being investigated by the House Education and Workforce Committee over its response to anti-Semitism on campus, according to a document obtained by The Daily.

In a Friday letter to University President Michael Schill and Board of Trustees Chairman Peter Barris, Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-N.C., who chairs the committee, asked the university to provide the committee with seven sets of documents related to its response represent the latest pro-Palestinian camp at Deering Meadow until May 17.

The documents include communications between university officials about the camp and alleged incidents of anti-Semitism on campus, Board of Trustees meeting minutes, video and audio recordings of the camp, and documents related to NU’s Qatar campus.

Schill is is scheduled to testify before the committee on May 23 along with Rutgers University President Jonathan Holloway, who served as NU chancellor from 2017 to 2020, and University of California, Los Angeles Chancellor Gene Block.

Since reach an agreement with student protesters Schill decided to de-escalate the camp on April 29th came under fire from organizations like StandWithUs and the Anti-Defamation League Midwest that are demands his resignation.

“The unlawful pro-terror camp referred to as the ‘Northwest Liberated Zone’ disrupted campus life and became a focus of pervasive anti-Semitic harassment and hostility,” Foxx wrote in the letter. “Instead of enforcing the university’s rules and disciplining those who violated them, Northwestern’s leaders surrendered to violators in a shameful agreement.”

The letter points to Schill’s decision not to consult the President’s Advisory Committee on the Prevention of Anti-Semitism and Hatred about the agreement and the subsequent collapse of the committee after seven members resigned.

It describes the Deering Meadow camp as a “site of numerous crimes and anti-Semitic incidents.” several incidents in which Jewish students say they were intimidated or harassed by protesters, a video of a protester wearing a hoodie with an image of Hamas spokesman Abu Obeida, and two signs posted earlier on the fence between Deering Meadow and Sheridan Road .

“The record makes clear that President Schill and other Northwest leaders have not only failed to address the pervasive anti-Semitic harassment and disruption of a safe learning environment that has seriously plagued the university, but have also surrendered to the perpetrators are responsible for this hatred and chaos,” says the Friday letter. “This is an unacceptable dereliction of duty.”

Schill went into the pictures In an April 30 video message to the NU community, he explained that the signs – one depicting a Star of David with a red line in it and another showing himself with devil horns – were an anti-Semitic image dating back to the Middle Ages, a “blood libel.” “-allegations against Jewish people – should be condemned by all of us.”

In an op-ed Thursday published in the Chicago Tribune and shared with the campus community in a school-wide email Friday morning, Schill again defended his decision to reach an agreement with pro-Palestinian protesters.

“This decision – as fragile as it may be – was possible because we decided to see our students not as a mob, but as young people who were in the learning process,” Schill wrote in the comment. “This was possible because we tried respectful dialogue instead of coercion. And it was possible because we tried to follow a set of principles, many of which I believe lie at the core of the tenets of Judaism.”

In the agreement, NU obliged to establish a new company an Advisory Committee on Investment Responsibility this fall. The university also agreed to answer questions from all “internal stakeholders,” which include current students, faculty, staff and trustees its financial investments.

But in a May 3 interview on CNN, Schill said he would “never recommend divestment” to the board of trustees.

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X: @jacob_wendler

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