George Washington University Anti-Israel Groups Call for Non-Cooperation With Trump Administration

Anti-Israel groups at George Washington University (GW) in Washington, DC kicked off the new academic year by issuing a slew of statements which implored school officials to reject a legal settlement with the Trump administration that addresses antisemitism on campus.

The pronouncements, first reported by The GW Hatchet on Friday, came days after the Civil Rights Division of the US Department of Justice announced earlier this month that it had amassed sufficient evidence to prove that GW violated Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, having responded to campus antisemitism “by acting deliberately indifferent” to the harm it posed to Jewish students and faculty.

Friday was reportedly the deadline for the university to take its first steps toward a voluntary resolution agreement with the federal government that may spare it from potentially catastrophic financial penalties such as those levied against Columbia University, Brown University, and Harvard University during the 2024-2025 academic year. The day came and passed with the university confirming that a dialogue been it and the Trump administration has ensued without its commenting on the substance of what has been said.

“As alumni, we unequivocally stand against the ongoing federal attack on the GWU community and academia more broadly,” a group which calls itself GW Alum for Palestine wrote on Friday. “The Trump administration has targeted universities as part of its authoritarian agenda, curtailing political expression, and punishing movements and individuals that challenge its power.”

A week earlier, GW suspended Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), a radical anti-Israel group, through May after finding that it had promoted antisemitism on social media and planned to hold an unauthorized, anti-Israel event on April 20, which many observers noted was also Adolph Hitler’s birthday.

“Criticism of Israel is not inherently antisemitic,” the group said in a statement. “This action by the Trump administration is not a good faith effort to combat antisemitism but another attempt to use Jewish people as an excuse to silence, persecute, and attack our peers.”

Meanwhile, on Friday, another group, GWU Left Coalition, charged that “the White House is waging war against colleges and universities across the country” and said an agreement with the Trump administration poses an “imminent danger to student safety and privacy.”

As previously reported by The Algemeiner, George Washington University has been a hub of extreme anti-Zionist activity that school officials have struggled to quell. A major source of such conduct has been the campus group Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), which, among other things, has threatened a Jewish professor and intimidated Jews on campus.

Recently, a student used her commencement speech to lodge accusations of apartheid and genocide against Israel, a notion trafficked by neo-Nazi groups and jihadist terror organizations.

The student, Cecilia Culver, accused Israel of targeting Palestinians “simply for [their] remaining in the country of their ancestors” and said that GW students are passive contributors to the “imperialist system.” An economics and statistics major, Culver deceived administrators who selected her to address the Columbian College of the Arts and Sciences ceremony, the university said in a statement, claiming she strayed from her prepared remarks.

GW faculty have also allegedly contributed to the promotion of antisemitism on campus. In 2023, former psychology professor Lara Sheehi was accused of verbally abusing and discriminating against her Jewish graduate students.

As recounted in a 2023 civil rights complaint filed by StandWithUs, Sheehi was accused of expressing contempt for Jews when, on the first day of term in August 2022, she asked every student to share information about their backgrounds and cultures. Replying to a student who revealed that she was Israeli, Sheehi allegedly said, “It’s not your fault you were born in Israel.” Jewish students said they made several attempts to persuade the university to correct Sheehi’s behavior or arrange an alternative option for fulfilling the requirements of her course. Each time, StandWithUs alleged, administrators said nothing could be done.

Later, the complaint added, Sheehi spread rumors that her Jewish students were “combative” racists and filed misconduct charges against them. One student told The Algemeiner at the time that she never learned what university policies Sheehi accused her and her classmates of violating.

In May, a civil lawsuit recounted dozens of antisemitic incidents which occurred at the university following the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel. It alleged that school officials failed to respond to adequately to them because of anti-Jewish, as well as anti-Zionist, bias. Among the incidents detailed, the campus Hillel Center was vandalized; someone threw a rock through the window of a truck owned by a Jewish advocacy group; and a Jewish student was told to “kill yourself” and “watch your back” in a hate message which also called her a “filthy k—ke.”

That and more transpired, court documents charged.

“GW took no meaningful action and was instead deliberately indifferent to the complaints it received, the misconduct that occurred, and the harms that were suffered by its Jewish and Israeli students and faculty,” the Justice Department said on Aug. 12 while sharing a document containing its findings. “The Justice Department will seek immediate remediation with GW for its civil rights violations.”

George Washington University, speaking through spokesperson Shannon McClendon, later responded to the Justice Department in a statement which summarized the institution’s actions and policies while stopping short of offering a contentious refutation of the government’s case.

“We have taken appropriate action under university policy and the law to hold individuals or organizations accountable, including during the encampment, and we do not tolerate behavior that threatens our community or undermines meaningful dialogue,” McClendon said. “We have worked diligently with members of GW’s Jewish community, as well as Jewish community organizations, city, and federal authorities to protect the GW community from antisemitism and we remain committed to working with them to ensure every student has the right to equal educational opportunities without fear of harassment and abuse.”

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.