Two Jewish Students Attacked at Pitt

Two Jewish students at the University of Pittsburgh were assaulted while on their way to a Shabbat dinner at the university Hillel on Aug. 30.

The two students, Asher Goodwin and Ilan Gordon, were hit on their heads from behind with a glass bottle by a man wearing a red shirt and a keffiyeh. Goodwin suffered cuts on his neck and Gordon suffered a concussion after being hit on the cheek. One of the students — media reports have not indicated which — held the assailant on the ground until police arrived.

The alleged assailant, 52-year-old Jarrett Buba, was subsequently arrested and is being charged with assault, reckless endangerment, harassment and resisting arrest. University Vice Provost for Student Affairs Carla Panzella and Vice Chancellor for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Clyde Wilson Pickett said in a statement that Buba is not believed to have any affiliation with the university and that law enforcement has concluded that the attack was not targeting any particular group of people.

Gordon, however, argued to CNN’s Gabe Cohen that he and Goodwin were in fact targeted for being Jewish. “Asher and I were the only two students wearing yarmulkes, openly Jewish, and we were the only ones attacked by this man wearing a keffiyeh, who came from across the street,” Gordon said.

“Asher and I were the only two students wearing yarmulkes, openly Jewish, and we were the only ones attacked by this man wearing a keffiyeh, who came from across the street.” Ilan Gordon

Panzella and Pickett also said in their statement, “There is no room in our community for violence and we condemn, in no uncertain terms, antisemitism, all forms of hate, and the actions of the alleged assailant. We also recognize that there is nothing more important than the safety of every member of our community.” They added that they are “providing additional resources” to campus police “to ensure additional security officers are available as escorts to students, faculty, and staff traversing to Friday night services or other events.”

Buba has been denied bail and also faces allegations of throwing a bottle at two people at Carnegie Mellon university on Aug. 29; the bottle hit a vehicle and no was injured.

Goodwin told CNN that, as a Jewish student, he feels “like an alien” on campus, as it’s “now common rhetoric that if you go to Hillel, you support genocide.”

A Jewish student affiliated with Chabad, on the other hand, told The Journal that while they think the university’s statement on the incident is “very weak,” they still believe that the university “is one of the best colleges for a Jewish student to go to, incidents here are few and far between. There have been a couple, there has been a little bit of an uptick, but it’s not enough for me to say I don’t feel safe here.”