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Verified verbatimUniversity of Pittsburgh community message from Vice Provost for Student Affairs Carla Panzella and Vice Chancellor for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Clyde Wilson Pickett, August 31, 2024 — quoted in University Times coverage902 chars
While hundreds of students were in the Cathedral of Learning, an assailant not affiliated with the University attacked two of our Jewish students with a glass bottle, injuring them both. Pitt Police were on the scene and immediately arrested the suspect. The two impacted students were treated at the scene.
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 have spoken with those impacted by the incident and have been in contact with the Hillel University Center to offer support to our students, and with the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh.
As the suspect was immediately arrested, there is no continuing criminal threat to the public, and no Pitt ENS message was sent. The assault was determined by law enforcement not to be targeted or directed towards any specific group.
No Pitt ENS (Emergency Notification System) alert was sent at the time of the attack — the message explicitly explains why, citing the immediate arrest and absence of an ongoing threat
Editorial criticism in The Pitt News took aim at the line 'not to be targeted or directed towards any specific group' as inconsistent with the FBI's contemporaneous hate-crime evaluation
The administrative byline (Panzella and Pickett, not the chancellor) signaled a student-affairs framing rather than a presidential statement — a contrast with peer institutions that issued chancellor-level statements after antisemitic incidents in 2024
Naming Hillel JUC and the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh in a community message was a deliberate institutional partnership signal during the post-October-7 wave of campus antisemitism