University of Michigan regent’s home vandalized in antisemitic attack
By Jake Tapper and Chelsea Bailey, CNN
(CNN) — The home of a Jewish member of the University of Michigan’s Board of Regents was vandalized early Monday, in what the university described as “a clear act of antisemitic intimidation.”
The incident marks the third time Jordan Acker, a Michigan attorney elected to the board overseeing the university’s governance, has been targeted since the start of the Israel-Hamas war.
“The University of Michigan condemns these criminal acts in the strongest possible terms,” the school said in a statement. “They are abhorrent and, unfortunately, just the latest in a number of incidents where individuals have been harassed because of their work on behalf of the university. This is unacceptable and will not be tolerated.”
The sound of shattering glass jolted Acker from his sleep just after 2 a.m. Monday, he told CNN. He went downstairs to find his front windows had been smashed and his wife’s car vandalized with what he described as “messages about Palestine with a Hamas upside triangle.”
The upside-down triangle has become a symbol of violent resistance to Israel, according to the Anti-Defamation League. Photos provided by Acker show someone scrawled “Divest” and “Free Palestine” on the vehicle.
Acker said his neighbors captured the incident on their ring camera and called the police. CNN has reached out to the Huntington Woods Police Department for comment.
“As a public official, you expect a certain level of criticism – even protests – but this is not protest, this is terrorism,” Acker said, adding the incident took place while his daughters were asleep upstairs.
“This has nothing to do with the First Amendment, has nothing to do with Palestine, nothing to do with Israel and everything to do with trying to harass and intimidate Jews,” Acker said, “And this Jew will not be intimidated by it.”
The latest incident comes after months of escalating tensions between the university’s administration and students who have used increasingly confrontational tactics to demand leaders divest from Israel.
In May, protesters held late-night demonstrations outside the private homes of several university regents, placing fake bloody body bags on their lawns and tacking a list of demands to their front doors, according to a statement from university president Santa J. Ono. Acker’s home was among those targeted.
Then, in June, Acker’s law firm, Goodman Acker, was vandalized with pro-Palestinian language, CNN previously reported. At the time, the Southfield Police Department said they would investigate the incident as a hate crime.
Acker said he’s received numerous private messages of sympathy following each of the attacks against him, but he said it is no longer enough.
“Public leaders have public obligations, and I would call on every member of our congressional delegation – any elected official in Michigan – to call this out publicly as antisemitism because that’s exactly what this is,” he said.
The-CNN-Wire
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