Antifa causes over $1 million in damage to University of Washington during Gaza protest

Antifa militants and anti-Israel radicals caused over $1 million in damage to a brand-new engineering building at the University of Washington during a violent occupation Monday night.

Tuesday morning, a professor took KOMO News through the Interdisciplinary Engineering Building and showed that doors were pulled off hinges, others were glued shut, walls were vandalized, windows were smashed, and machine manufacturing tools worth thousands of dollars were destroyed. 

A spokesman for the University of Washington told The Ari Hoffman Show on Talk Radio 570 KVI, “I have learned that this is a very early estimate of damage to some equipment in one room, but we do not have an estimate on the rest of the building.”

The damage was so extensive that the spokesman told Hoffman, “At least two dozen classes are being moved to other locations while the building remains closed for the rest of the week. These impact the majority of departments in the College of Engineering, and primarily undergraduate education. Classes include introduction to biomechanics and core principles of human design centered engineering.”

Some sources speculated the building could be closed for the rest of the year.

The $100 million building was recently completed thanks in part of a $10 million donation from Boeing. The violent radicals targeted the building to demand the university cut ties with the aerospace company because it does business with Israel. 

According to the King County Prosecutor’s Office, 31 activists were arrested by police during the violent occupation. Approximately half of them were students at the university.

On Monday night, multiple fires were set by the radicals dressed in black bloc and wrapped in keffiyehs who barricaded the doors and occupied the building. Activists blocked streets with bike racks and dumpsters before setting them on fire. University police called in the Seattle Police Department and the Washington State Patrol to help end the occupation and arrest the radicals.

Student group Super UW organized the action and had been suspended for its role in causing over $50,000 in damage to the Husky Union Building last year during a similar action. Pro-Hamas and Antifa activists have been allowed to control parts of the campus since the Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attacks against Israel. In the spring of 2024, agitators occupied the quad and set up an encampment, which remained in place for three weeks. Jewish students were blocked from traversing the campus, and buildings were regularly vandalized with antisemitic graffiti. Crews sent to clean up the mess had their vehicles and equipment damaged by the activists.

UW President Ana Marie Cause issued a statement condemning Monday night’s violence and antisemitism, but many felt it was too little, too late after more than a year of allowing activists to have the run of the campus.