Anti-Semitic and Homophobic Messages Found on Walls of Brown Dorms
(JTA) — Anti-Semitic and homophobic messages were written on the walls of a student dormitory at Brown University.
The vandalism discovered early Friday morning at the Providence, Rhode Island, school came days after the cancellation of an appearance by prominent African-American transgender activist Janet Mock at the Brown University Hillel after facing criticism for allegedly supporting the Jewish group’s “pinkwashing” of Israeli treatment of the Palestinians.
The graffiti discovered in the Marcy House student housing, written in black marker, read “Gay will die” and “Holocaust 2.0,” the Brown Daily Herald, a campus student newspaper, reported.
A Jewish fraternity, Beta Rho Pi, is housed in the building, and many LGBTQ students also live there, according to the newspaper. Members of the Jewish fraternity and Zeta Delta Xi, a coed fraternity also housed in the building, washed the graffiti off the walls the same night it was discovered.
“One message was directly across from my dorm room, apparently reacting to the Hebrew writing and Mezuzah on my door,” wrote senior Sam Rubinstein, a member of to Zeta Delta Xi, in an email to The Herald, which he also posted on Facebook.
The two fraternities released a joint statement.
“We are devastated and outraged that this anti-Semitic and homophobic hate crime — and to be clear, this is a hate crime — occurred in our home,” they wrote.
The campus Department of Public Safety reportedly has launched an investigation.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a gift today!
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Most Popular
- 1
Fast Forward Ye debuts ‘Heil Hitler’ music video that includes a sample of a Hitler speech
- 2
Opinion It looks like Israel totally underestimated Trump
- 3
Culture Cardinals are Catholic, not Jewish — so why do they all wear yarmulkes?
- 4
Fast Forward Student suspended for ‘F— the Jews’ video defends himself on antisemitic podcast
In Case You Missed It
-
Culture How one Jewish woman fought the Nazis — and helped found a new Italian republic
-
Opinion It looks like Israel totally underestimated Trump
-
Fast Forward Betar ‘almost exclusively triggered’ former student’s detention, judge says
-
Fast Forward ‘Honey, he’s had enough of you’: Trump’s Middle East moves increasingly appear to sideline Israel
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.