Federal prosecutors unsealed a sweeping indictment Wednesday against eight pro-Palestinian activists, accusing them of running a coordinated campaign of threats, vandalism, and chemical attacks aimed at forcing the University of Michigan to sever its financial ties to Israel.
The Justice Department filed charges in the Eastern District of Michigan on June 10, naming eight defendants, most of them current or former University of Michigan students and staff members, with conspiracy to transmit threats in interstate and foreign commerce. Two of the eight, Zainab Aliasgar Hakim and Paige Elizabeth Feyock, face additional charges of witness intimidation, according to the DOJ press release. The alleged campaign ran from October 2023, shortly after the Hamas attacks on Israel, through April 2025.
The other defendants named in the indictment are Amatullah Aliasgar Hakim, Ahmet Kerem Korkaya, Jonathan Hongru Zou, Alexander Matthew Sepulveda, Mariam Muhammed Odeh, and Colin Hunter Weger. All eight are in their 20s. Six made initial appearances in federal court in Detroit on Wednesday. One was arrested in Wisconsin; another remained at large at the time the charges were announced.
The alleged tactics were methodical and deliberately menacing. Prosecutors say the group spray-painted "Intifada" and "Free Palestine" on the homes of university officials, shattered windows, and threw glass jars filled with noxious chemicals into family residences where children were present. Fake bloody corpses were reportedly placed on the front lawn of a sitting university regent. The Ann Arbor home of then-President Santa Ono was tagged with anti-Israel graffiti. According to court documents, the conspirators marked their targets with symbols associated with Hamas, including red inverted triangles and red handprints, and coordinated their operations through encrypted messaging applications and overseas collaboration platforms.
Prosecutors say the intimidation had a specific goal: to coerce the University of Michigan into pulling its endowment from companies with any ties to Israel. Pro-Palestinian protesters have demanded divestment since Hamas launched its October 7, 2023, attacks. The university has consistently maintained it holds no direct investments in Israeli firms, and that its exposure through outside funds amounts to less than $15 million, less than 0.1 percent of its total endowment, according to university disclosures.
The indictment also describes attacks on private Michigan businesses and the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit, extending the alleged conspiracy well beyond the Ann Arbor campus. Targets were reportedly identified and marked through a coordinated research process conducted over encrypted platforms, court documents show.
Federal prosecutors in Michigan said in a statement Wednesday that the charges represent a firm response to organized intimidation. "In America, we rule by law not by fear," the U.S. attorney's office said in the press release. "These alleged threats and attempts to terrorize government officials, businesses, and the Jewish Federation are anti-American. We will counter intimidation with justice."
Charges and What Comes Next
The core conspiracy charge carries a potential sentence of up to five years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000 per count, according to the Justice Department. The two defendants facing witness intimidation charges each face up to 20 years. The case marks one of the most significant federal prosecutions to date tied to the wave of campus anti-Israel protest activity that followed October 2023.
The Trump Justice Department has taken a more aggressive posture on campus-related intimidation than its predecessor. Critics of the Biden administration have argued that similar conduct during the protest surge of 2024 and early 2025 drew limited federal scrutiny. The Justice Department has not publicly addressed whether earlier incidents in Ann Arbor were referred for prosecution and declined.
The six defendants in custody are expected to enter pleas in the coming weeks. Building a conspiracy case around a dispersed group that communicated primarily through encrypted applications will likely present evidentiary challenges at trial. With one defendant still at large and a verdict months away at the earliest, the federal fight over where campus protest ends and criminal intimidation begins has only just started.
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