The woman seen on the FSU campus in a viral video involving antisemitic comments has been charged with misdemeanor battery.
The victim recorded part of the confrontation in the Leach Student Recreation Center on July 30. The woman confronted him with comments like “(expletive) Israel,” ‘‘free Palestine,” then appeared to shove him or his phone. The man, of Jewish descent, was wearing a shirt with the words Israel Defense Forces.
A court document quotes the victim as telling a police investigator, "She definitely just hate crimed me." The victim is also quoted as saying, "She is telling me like, you need to go to hell, your family needs to die, you guys are killing people."
The investigator then spoke with a Leach employee who talked to the suspect immediately after the incident. The employee quoted the suspect as saying, “He's able to wear that shirt but I can't protest this on campus."
The investigator who compiled the document wrote that the suspect “was referring to an ongoing military and political conflict about land and self-determination within the territory of the former Mandatory Palestine.”
The woman in the video is an FSU graduate student. She has been barred from campus pending the university’s investigation of the incident. She will be arraigned on the battery charge Sept. 18.
As the video went viral, FSU put out a statement saying the school is "actively addressing [the] altercation" and "strongly condemns antisemitism in all forms."
U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi quickly took to social media to praise FSU President Richard McCullough for taking prompt action. She wrote, “Antisemitism will not be tolerated in Florida or anywhere else." She also said the federal government is looking into the matter.
What is antisemitism?
A law passed in Florida last year defines antisemitism based on the definition developed by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA).
The bill, HB 187, says the legislature’s intent was to “assist in the monitoring and reporting of anti-Semitic hate crimes and discrimination and to make residents aware of and to combat such incidents in this state.”
According to the bill, antisemitism “means a certain perception of Jewish individuals which may be expressed as hatred toward such individuals. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish and non-Jewish individuals and their property and toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.”
The bill offers examples of antisemitism, including:
· Calling for, aiding, or justifying the killing or harming of Jewish individuals.
· Making mendacious, dehumanizing, demonizing, or stereotypical allegations about Jewish individuals as such or the power of Jewish people as a collective, such as the myth of a worldwide Jewish conspiracy or of Jewish individuals controlling the media, economy, government, or other societal institutions.
· Accusing Jewish people as a collective of being responsible for real or imagined wrongdoing committed by a single Jewish person or group or for acts committed by non Jewish individuals.
A legislative staff analysis of the bill cited a state and national rise in hate crimes motivated by religion -- and antisemitic incidents in particular.
