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Judge Tosses Challenge to Antisemitism Investigation of University of Pennsylvania
Pro-Hamas encampment at University of Pennsylvania on May 5, 2024. Photo: Robyn Stevens Brody via Reuters Connect
A US federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit challenging a congressional investigation of antisemitism at the University of Pennsylvania, delivering a blow to an anti-Zionist faculty group which hoped to prevent important documents from being shared with lawmakers while the matter was litigated.
Since last year, the US House Committee on Education and the Workforce has been investigating the University of Pennsylvania (Penn) to determine whether it intentionally ignored dozens of antisemitic incidents perpetrated by students and faculty. As part of its inquiry, the committee, led by US Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-NC), subpoenaed the university for a trove of documents, including reports and correspondence, which would provide a window into how administrators discussed antisemitism on campus.
Accusing Congress of engaging in a “new form of McCarthyism” — a historical reference to the excessive efforts of lawmakers to purge Communist Party members from important public institutions in the 1950s — and violating constitutional protections of speech and privacy, a group calling itself Faculty for Justice in Palestine (FJP) asked the US District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania to grant a preliminary and permanent injunction to end the university’s cooperation with the investigation.
“I conclude Plaintiffs lack standing to bring this challenge,” Judge Mitchell S. Goldberg said in a ruling issued on Monday. “They have not alleged what information Penn will disclose or how it will harm them … Plaintiffs have not alleged facts sufficient to give them a personal stake in the outcome of this litigation, and their complaint will be dismissed for lack o standing. Where a plaintiff lacks standing, a federal court has no authority to enter an injunction.”
According to court documents first shared by The Daily Pennsylvanian, the principal plaintiff of the suit, associate professor Huda Fakhreddine, engaged in actions that played an outsized role in prompting Congress to investigate Penn.
Last fall, Fakhreddine organized the Palestine Writes Literature Festival, which invited to campus several anti-Zionists who have spread blood libels as well as conspiracies of Jewish control. He has also praised Hamas’ Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel as a “new way of life.”
In the complaint, FJP dismissed concerns about rising antisemitism at Penn, describing efforts to eradicate it as a conspiracy by “billionaire donors, pro-Israel groups, other litigants, and segments of the media” to squelch criticism of Israel and harm Arab students and academics. It also castigated the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, calling it a tool of a “militant minority which believes that Israel can do no wrong.” The group also alleged that the IHRA definition is “unconstitutional” and part of a larger plan of a “social engineering movement” to abolish the First Amendment.
“I wasn’t surprised by the ruling,” City University of New York history professor KC Johnson told The Algemeiner on Monday, responding to the news. “The professors’ core complaint focused more on a policy dispute with Penn than the law. They wanted Penn to resist the House subpoena, despite the university having no real grounds for doing so, and seemed aggrieved that Penn leaders were unwilling to denounce the House committee as a latter-day version of McCarthyism or to deny that any of the professors’ actions or rhetoric could be deemed antisemitic.”
Johnson added, “Those sorts of issues might be relevant at a faculty Senate meeting, but it was hard to see how the professors could show any concrete harm that would give them standing in court.”
If FJP’s lawsuit had been successful in halting Congress’s investigation into Penn, it would have concealed from lawmakers — and thereby the public — demonstrative evidence that Fakhreddine and other officials involved in organizing the “Palestine Writes” festival intentionally invited speakers to campus who have been widely accused of antisemitism.
Speakers listed on the event’s initial itinerary included University of Gaza professor Refaat Alareer, who said in 2018, “Are most Jews evil? Of course they are,” and Salman Abu Sitta, who once said in an interview that “Jews were hated in Europe because they played a role in the destruction of the economy in some of the countries, so they would hate them.” The event touched off a burst of antisemitic incidents at Penn. In the days leading up to it, swastikas were graffitied on campus and a student infiltrated the campus Hillel building, where he proceeded to vandalize the place while screaming antisemitic epithets.
Roger Waters, the former Pink Floyd frontman, was a scheduled speaker. Last year, an explosive documentary showed fellow musicians detailing Waters’ long record of anti-Jewish barbs. In one instance, a former colleague recalled Waters at a restaurant yelling at the wait staff to “take away the Jew food.”
By the time former Penn president Elizabeth M. Magill — who resigned in December — appeared before the House Education and Workforce Committee on Dec. 5 to testify about her handling of “Palestine Writes” — which included her refusing to cancel it — anti-Zionist protests at the university amid the Israel-Hamas war had descended into demagoguery and intimidation of Jewish students, as activists berated pro-Israel counter-protesters for condemning Hamas’ Oct. 7 onslaught.
The University of Pennsylvania’s response to rising antisemitism after the events of this academic year has been mixed. At the end of May, its Task Force on Antisemitism issued a report denouncing the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel — which aims to isolate the Jewish state as the first step toward destroying it — as “discriminatory” and “anti-intellectual,” but it opposed adopting the IHRA definition of antisemitism. Describing the widely accepted IHRA definition as “controversial,” the report’s authors explained that other definitions of antisemitism, such as the “Jerusalem Definition” and the “Nexus Document,” are in tension with IHRA’s, preventing them from reaching a consensus about which is best.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post Judge Tosses Challenge to Antisemitism Investigation of University of Pennsylvania first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Trump Signs Major Deals With Qatar as New Report Reveals Doha’s $40 Billion Influence Network Across US
US President Donald Trump and Qatar’s Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani attend a signing ceremony in Doha, Qatar, May 14, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Brian Snyder
As US President Donald Trump visited Qatar on Wednesday as part of his three-country tour of the Middle East, a new report exposed the extent of Qatar’s far-reaching financial entanglements within American institutions, shedding light on what experts describe as a coordinated effort to influence US policy making and public opinion in Doha’s favor.
According to the report, which was published by the Middle East Forum (MEF), a US-based think tank, Qatar has attempted to expand its soft power in the US by spending $33.4 billion on business and real estate projects, over $6 billion on universities, and $72 million on American lobbyists since 2012.
“Qatar, a tiny Gulf emirate with just 300,000 citizens, has deployed nearly $40 billion across our nation’s institutions since 2012. This is not mere investment. It is calculated influence,” MEF executive director Gregg Roman wrote in the report’s foreword. “The pattern is clear: Qatar targets critical infrastructure, including our energy grid. It bankrolls academic departments that foment campus unrest, buys Manhattan skyscrapers, and infiltrates Silicon Valley. Its capital flows to Washington insiders who shape Middle East policy.”
The report, written by the MEF’s Benjamin Baird, came amid mounting scrutiny over Trump’s announcement that he plans to accept a $400 million luxury private jet from Qatar as a gift. It was also published as Trump was in the Middle East this week visiting Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates to speak with regional leaders and strike several economic deals.
On Wednesday, when Trump was in Qatar, he signed what the White House touted as a sweeping “economic exchange” worth at least $1.2 trillion with the Qatari government.
The agreement will likely fuel criticism from experts and lawmakers who have warned about Qatar’s long-standing support for Islamist terrorist organizations such as Hamas and extensive investments in the US.
In 2015, for example, the Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), the country’s sovereign wealth fund, announced plans to invest $45 billion in the US over five years. According to MEF’s analysis, that target has likely been met — or exceeded — amid the continued growth of QIA’s global asset base.
Of the $39.8 billion in Qatari money traced by MEF, an estimated $33.43 billion went into commercial ventures like real estate, private equity, and hedge funds. The QIA acquired stakes in the Empire State Building and the Plaza Hotel, with QIA’s Manhattan real estate investments alone totaling at least $6.2 billion.
Qatar has also invested deeply in US critical infrastructure, including the power grid, liquified natural gas production, oil pipelines, and plastics manufacturing, raising concerns among national security experts.
The report also revealed that Qatar has emerged as the largest foreign donor to American higher education, giving US universities a staggering $6.25 billion since 2012. Between January 2023 and October 2024, Qatari contributions totaled roughly $980 million.
Qatar’s financial ties to American universities have come under intensifying scrutiny following the surge in pro-Hamas, anti-Israel Israel campus protests in the aftermath of the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel. Observers argue that foreign actors, including Qatar, have used generous donations to encourage universities to hire radical academics and startup anti-Israel academic programs.
A 2023 from the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy found that concealed donations from foreign governments, especially Qatar, to US educational institutions have been associated with an increase in antisemitic incidents on campus and the erosion of liberal norms.
Despite the prevalence of what MEF described as Qatar’s “influence network” in the US, Trump on Sunday announced that the Department of Defense would receive a luxury Boeing 747-8 jumbo jet as a “gift, free of charge” from Qatar. According to Trump, the jet will serve as a replacement to “the 40-year-old Air Force One.” It will be considered property of the US federal government until the end of Trump’s term in office, after which ownership of the aircraft will be transferred to the Trump presidential library foundation.
On Monday, Trump defended his controversial decision to accept the $400 million luxury jet.
“I think it’s a great gesture from Qatar. I appreciate it very much,” he said while speaking to reporters in the Oval Office. “I would never be one to turn down that kind of an offer. I mean, I could be a stupid person and say, ‘No, we don’t want a free, very expensive airplane.’ But it was — I thought it was a great gesture.”
The US president argued that the Qatari government gifted him the jet because he has “helped them a lot over the years in terms of security and safety.”
Trump’s plan to accept the splashy airliner set off a firestorm of criticism among foreign policy experts and some lawmakers, especially Democrats, with skeptics accusing the president of violating the Emoluments Clause of the US Constitution, which prohibits federal officials from accepting gifts from foreign countries without the consent of Congress. Others expressed concern that Doha could use the gift as leverage to influence US policy in the Middle East.
Democratic Senate leader Chuck Schumer (NY) suggested that the gift from Qatar is an attempt to bribe Trump and gain “influence” in the US government.
Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) also lambasted Trump’s announcement and called for a probe into Qatar’s gift. In a letter addressed to the Government Accountability Office comptroller general, the Defense Department acting inspector general, and the Office of Government Ethics acting director, Torres suggested that the gift likely runs afoul of the Emoluments Clause.
“With an estimated value of $400 million, the aerial palace would constitute the most valuable gift ever conferred on a [resident by a foreign government,” Torres posted on X/Twitter. “Just as troubling as the gift itself is the identity of the benefactor. Qatar is not a neutral party on the world stage. It has a deeply troubling history of financing a barbaric terrorist organization that has the blood of Americans on its hands.”
Meanwhile, Trump on Wednesday signed a series of agreements totaling at least $1.2 trillion with Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani in Doha.
The deal includes a $96 billion order of Boeing jets and GE Aerospace engines. Beyond aircrafts, the deals encompass over $243.5 billion in trade and infrastructure agreements with companies such as McDermott and Parsons, and a $1 billion joint venture in quantum technologies.
Alongside commercial investments, the US signed major defense deals with Qatar, including nearly $3 billion for advanced drone systems and counter-drone technology from Raytheon and General Atomics. A broader $38 billion framework agreement for military cooperation, including potential expansion at Al Udeid Air Base, further cements Qatar’s strategic influence in US defense planning.
The post Trump Signs Major Deals With Qatar as New Report Reveals Doha’s $40 Billion Influence Network Across US first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Canadian Man Sentenced to Jail for Antisemitic Assault on Jewish Couple After Synagogue Visit
People attend Canada’s Rally for the Jewish People at Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Ontario, in December 2023. Photo: Shawn Goldberg via Reuters Connect
A Canadian man has been sentenced to one year in jail and two years of probation after being convicted of assault in an antisemitic attack on a Jewish couple walking home from synagogue last year.
On Monday, the Ontario Court of Justice sentenced 36-year-old Kenneth Jeewan Gobin after his March conviction on two counts of assault and one count of breaching probation.
According to court evidence, Gobin — who has an extensive criminal record and was on probation for a previous crime at the time of the attack — deliberately planned the assault against the Jewish couple, driven by antisemitic hatred.
The incident took place on Jan. 6, 2024, when Gobin, riding an electric bicycle, approached four Jewish adults returning home from synagogue and deliberately mounted the curb to target them. He then began assaulting the two couples, hurling antisemitic slurs during the attack.
As he continued hitting the victims, he performed a Nazi salute and shouted antisemitic insults, including “Hitler should have killed you all” and “You should have died in the Holocaust,” striking one of the women in the process.
The sentencing came after a months-long trial, during which the court heard multiple victim and community impact statements.
Among several testimonies submitted to the court, Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center (FSWC) — a nonprofit human rights organization dedicated to Holocaust education and antisemitism programs — described Gobin’s attack as an “unprovoked, hate-motivated assault.”
“When expressions of hate are paired with physical acts of aggression, they pose a grave threat to public safety and social cohesion,” Jaime Kirzner-Roberts, FSWC’s senior director of policy and advocacy, said in a statement. “History has repeatedly shown that when this kind of hatred is ignored or minimized, it paves the way to more widespread and dangerous violence.”
“These acts are not isolated incidents — they’re part of a deeply troubling historical pattern whose gravity must be taken seriously,” Kirzner-Roberts continued. “Today’s sentence sends a strong and necessary message: hate-fueled violence cannot and will not go unpunished.”
As several other countries around the world, Canada has witnessed a surge in antisemitic incidents following the Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
In 2024, the country recorded a record-breaking 6,219 anti-Jewish incidents, according to B’nai Brith Canada, up from 5,791 the previous year. Although members of the Jewish community make up less than 1 percent of the country’s population, they were targeted in one-fifth of all hate crimes.
The post Canadian Man Sentenced to Jail for Antisemitic Assault on Jewish Couple After Synagogue Visit first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Yale University Leaves Pro-Hamas Hunger Strikers Hanging After Refusing Meeting
A Palestinian flag hangs over the doors of the Schwartzman Center with stickers covering Woolsey Hall during a demonstration at Yale University. Photo: Derek French/Sopa Images via Reuters Connect.
A pro-Hamas student group at Yale University has launched another disruptive protest to cap off the final weeks of the academic year, choosing this time to starve themselves inside an administrative building in lieu of establishing an illegal encampment.
“Hunger strikers have consumed nothing but water since Saturday,” Yalies4Palestine said in a press release explaining the action. “They have become hypoglycemic, are experiencing dizziness, faintness, extreme fatigue, inability to regulate their temperatures and concerningly low blood pressure, in addition to immense psychological pressure and stress.”
Yale administrators are refusing to meet with the students for a discussion of their demands that the university’s endowment be divested of any ties to Israel, as well as companies that do business with it, according to the Yale Daily News. On Tuesday, the fourth day of the demonstration, Yale student affairs dean Melanie Boyd briefly approached the students at the site of their demonstration, Sheffield-Sterling-Strathcona Hall, advising them to leave the space because “the administration does not intend to hold any additional meetings.”
A member of the Yale Corporation, the university’s board of trustees, previously met with a group of anti-Zionist students last September, to discuss their demands for the school to disclose and divest from any Israel-linked entities and military weapons manufacturers.
Now, however, Yale has no intention of holding another such meeting. School officials said that the latest hunger strike is being held in “violation of university policy,” noting that Yalie4Palestine was stripped of its recognized-organization-status due to similar, past transgressions — including an aborted attempt to camp out on the grounds of Beinecke Plaza in April.
In that case, the students eventually abandoned the demonstration after Yale’s assistant vice president for university life, Pilar Montalvo, walked through the area distributing cards containing a message which implored students to “Please stop your current action immediately. If you do not, you may risk university disciplinary action and/or arrest” and a QR code for a webpage which explains Yale’s policies on expression and free assembly.
The cards triggered a paranoiac fit, the News reported. Upon receiving them, the students became suspicious that the QR code could be used to track and identify those who participated in the unauthorized protest. “Do not scan the QR code!” they chanted in response. They decamped moments later, the paper added, clearing the way for public safety officers to photograph and remove the tents they had attempted to pitch.
This time, the students say they will not budge and are imploring their supporters to flood the phone lines of high-level Yale officials with calls demanding that they meet with the students.
Yalie4Palestine have provided the would-be callers a script. It says: “It is unconscionable that Yale administrators are more concerned about nonsensical university policies than the basic welfare of their own students and their complicity in the ongoing famine in Gaza. Yale must divest from military weapons companies aiding Israel’s genocide, end partnerships that normalize apartheid and occupation, and protect student protest rights.”
Yale University’s Advisory Committee on Investor Responsibility (ACIR) has before ruled against divesting from armaments manufacturers, saying in April 2024 that “it does not believe that such activity meets the criteria for divestment” because “this manufacturing supports socially necessary uses, such as law enforcement and national security.” The decision set off a raging protest which resulted in the assault of a Jewish student and the arrest of some 47 students who had trespassed Beinecke Plaza, where they vowed to abstain from food, as they are now, unless the university acceded to their demands.
The campus has seen a heightening of anti-Zionist and antisemitic behavior since Hamas’s invasion of southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. Less than a month after the onslaught, the Yale Daily News came under fire for removing what it called “unsubstantiated claims” of the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas raping and beheading Israelis on Oct. 7 from an article written by Sahar Tartak. Published on Oct. 12, the column — which lambasted Yalies4Palestine for defending and seemingly applauding Hamas’s atrocities — was at some point afterward censored to no longer include a portion describing reports and eyewitness accounts of Hamas raping and beheading Israeli civilians. The paper later apologized.
Additionally, on the day of the massacre, Zareena Grewal — an associate professor of American Studies, Ethnicity, Race & Migration, and Religious Studies at Yale who describes herself as a “radical Muslim” — defended Hamas, saying it had “every right to resist through armed struggle” while denouncing Israel as a “murderous, genocidal settler state.”
In another incident, a pro-Hamas activist spat in the direction of Jewish students, a group which included Jewish civil rights activist and Yale student Sahar Tartak.
In December, Yale University students voted in favor of a referendum calling for the school’s divestment from Israel — a core tenet of the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement.
“The referendum, proposed and written by the pro-Palestine Sumud Coalition, asked three questions. The first two ask whether Yale should disclose and divest from its holdings in military weapons manufacturers, ‘including those arming Israel,’ and the third asks whether Yale should ‘act on its commitment to education by investing in Palestinian scholars and students,’” the Yale Daily News reported at the time, noting that while each item received overwhelming “yes votes,” they equaled just over one-third of the student body.
The low threshold is, however, sufficient for the referendum questions being codified and passed as a resolution by the Yale College Council (YCC), which facilitated the referendum and spoke positively of it before students cast their votes. It also rings loudly to the school’s Jewish community, senior Netanel Crispe told The Algemeiner during an interview at the time, explaining that some 2,500 students voted for a policy aimed at compromising Israel’s national security to precipitate its destruction.
Yale University told The Algemeiner it will continue to foster intellectual diversity and a robust Jewish student life without discussing the merits, or lack thereof, of the referendum.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
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