Property damage to a Rolls-Royce facility in Novi, Michigan, which had phrases such as “MTU ARMS GENOCIDE” and “FREE PALESTINE” painted on its exterior. Rolls-Royce produces parts for Israeli army vehicles. MTU is Rolls-Royce’s German subsidiary, which makes the engines for the Israeli army’s Merkava tanks. (Photo via US DOJ) Property damage to a Rolls-Royce facility in Novi, Michigan, which had phrases such as “MTU ARMS GENOCIDE” and “FREE PALESTINE” painted on its exterior. Rolls-Royce produces parts for Israeli army vehicles. MTU is Rolls-Royce’s German subsidiary, which makes the engines for the Israeli army’s Merkava tanks. (Photo via US DOJ)
In the early morning hours of June 10, 2026, the FBI conducted raids against individuals involved in Palestine solidarity activism at the University of Michigan. With help from local and state police departments, including the University of Michigan Police, the raids unfolded simultaneously in Michigan, Illinois, and Wisconsin. In Ypsilanti, MI, agents in military gear rolled into a neighborhood in an armored vehicle, with guns drawn, terrorizing families and neighbors. A similar home raid took place in Chicago. In total, seven of the eight accused individuals were arrested (one was out of the country). The case is now known as the Michigan Eight.
The Justice Department indicted the eight defendants – five of whom are current or former students at the University of Michigan, and one of whom was a University employee – on multiple counts of severe charges, including “Conspiracy to Transmit Threats in Interstate and Foreign Commerce.” The defendants, all in their twenties, now potentially face decades in prison.
The main actions described in the indictment boil down to property damage, directed against the offices or homes of University of Michigan officials, the facilities of Rolls-Royce (which makes parts for Israeli army tanks) and Maersk (which ships military equipment to Israel), and the building of the Jewish Federation of Detroit (a major pro-Israel organization, as we will see). No person has been physically harmed by these actions.
Yet the indictment paints these actions as a form of antisemitic terrorism, drawing on the FBI’s extensive digital surveillance of the defendants. This narrative was crafted by the masters of deception – Trump’s Justice Department – and it does not stand up to scrutiny. While we do not know who was behind the actions (the defendants have pleaded not guilty), it is clear the actions have nothing to do with anti-Jewish racism or terrorism.
The goal of the wildly exaggerated indictment is to repress Palestine solidarity activism. The U.S. government plans to make an example of the Michigan Eight in order to deter attempts to disrupt institutions complicit in the genocide. It is part of a wider push to severely punish property damage and reframe the Palestine solidarity movement as “terrorism.” We must resist this criminalization and stand with the Michigan Eight.
FBI raid on the home of some of the Michigan Eight defendants in Ypsilanti, MI, June 10, 2026. Michigan State Police and University of Michigan Police participated in the raid. The same house had been previously raided by the FBI in April 2025, as part of the crackdown on the campus Palestine solidarity movement, where agents tore the door open with a battering ram.
Spinning a tale of antisemitic terrorism
The Justice Department presents the defendants as a terrorist group with an antisemitic agenda. Both characterizations are unfounded. Indeed, the defendants were not formally charged with terrorism, since the evidence for that is nonexistent. The Justice Department instead tried to create the appearance of terrorism by linking the defendants to Hamas (which the U.S. government considers a “terrorist organization,” not a legitimate resistance movement). Likewise, the DOJ’s narrative performs a slight of hand in labelling as antisemitic alleged acts and words which in fact reflect opposition to the policies and violence of the state of Israel.
In the brief arguing why the defendants should be detained, the Justice Department states that “the defendants are ardent supporters of Hamas and utilize Hamas’ messaging to threaten their victims.” Using data allegedly obtained from defendants’ devices, the brief claims the defendants “traded and possessed various Hamas killing videos.” The brief also presents a photo of one of the defendants with red paint on her hands, apparently taken in the defendant’s garage, and makes the absurd claim that it was just like “the infamous photo from the Ramallah Lynching of 2000, where two Israeli reserve soldiers were murdered and mutilated during the Second Intifada.”
Property damage to a Rolls-Royce facility in Novi, Michigan, which had phrases such as “MTU ARMS GENOCIDE” and “FREE PALESTINE” painted on its exterior. Rolls-Royce produces parts for Israeli army vehicles. MTU is Rolls-Royce’s German subsidiary, which makes the engines for the Israeli army’s Merkava tanks. (Source: US Justice Department)
In a June 12 bond hearing in Detroit, U.S. Attorney Maggie Smith stated that the defendants share “an extreme violent view directly tied to terrorism.” She spent much time in the hearing trying to argue that Hamas is an antisemitic terrorist group and that, by association, so are the defendants. Smith repeatedly stated that Hamas’s attack on October 7, 2023 was an attack not only against Israel or Israelis but on “Jews” generally. Smith ended her opening arguments by reading a “victim statement” from the Jewish Federation of Detroit, meant to prove the “antisemitism” of the alleged actions. Phrases such as “Free Palestine” had been painted on the Jewish Federation’s building, along with an inverted red triangle. The Jewish Federation claimed that the action against its building was an attack on “Jewish communal life” and that such actions constitute “acts of hatred toward Jews.” The Federation added that the use of the inverted red triangle was a reminder of “Hamas and its targeting of Jews” on October 7.
The fabrication of antisemitism appeared to work. Addressing one of the defendants in the June 12 hearing, Michigan District Judge Anthony Patti said he was appalled by the “antisemitic” nature of the alleged actions. He said he is “not immune” to the issue because he “grew up in a Jewish neighborhood” and “has Jewish friends,” adding that the Jews have been persecuted enough and that six million were murdered in WWII. Corporate media also boosted the narrative of antisemitism. The Detroit Free Press incorrectly reported that Jewish Federation’s building in Detroit “was targeted with antisemitic graffiti” and that the actions included the spreading of “antisemitic messages,” while the Detroit News ran a story about the University of Michigan “terror suspects” (even though no terrorism charge had been made).
Yet there is nothing “antisemitic” about the actions described in the indictment. For example, the graffiti on the Jewish Federation of Detroit’s building was in protest of Israel’s genocide, which is enabled by support from U.S. institutions – including the Jewish Federation. The indictment, the statements made during the hearing, and media accounts erroneously conflate criticism of Israel with antisemitism.
The Jewish Federation’s website offers “talking points” for defending Israel and discussing October 7. It repeats the widely debunked claims that Palestinian fighters beheaded babies, “killed babies in ovens,” and “raped women so violently that they broke the pelvic bones of their victims” – fabrications which have been used as justification for genocide and to deflect from and justify the documented violence carried out by Israel in its war on Gaza.
Screenshot from the homepage of the Jewish Federation of Detroit, a staunchly Zionist organization that fundraises for Israel and for many Zionist groups. The Jewish Federation distributed over $66.6 million dollars to various nonprofits in fiscal year 2023, including Friends of the IDF and numerous other Zionist organizations.
The Jewish Federation also materially supports Israel’s army. It boasted that since October 7, 2023, it worked with other Jewish Federations to raise $295,855 for Israeli soldiers, which “includes the purchase and delivery of protective eyewear, boots, sleeping bags and other supplies.” The Jewish Federation also donates tens of millions each year to other Zionist nonprofit organizations. In 2023, it gave $16,150 to Friends of the Israel Defense Forces, a nonprofit that sponsors Israeli soldiers and defends their actions. It also donated $10,000 to the Jewish National Fund, which for over a century has played a central role in dispossessing Palestinians of land. That year, the Jewish Federation also gave $334,260 to the Birthright Israel Foundation, which organizes propaganda trips designed to make young American Jews into fierce Zionists.
Depicting the defendants as foreign agents and criminalizing their beliefs
The Justice Department also advanced the narrative of terrorism by presenting the Michigan Eight defendants as brainwashed foreign agents, utilizing racist tropes.
Defendants who had travelled internationally were deemed by U.S. attorneys as suspicious. Their travel history was taken as evidence of “extensive international ties”; if the defendants had family in China or India, even worse. In the June 12 court hearing, U.S. Attorney Maggie Smith said that while one Chinese American defendant doesn’t have a Chinese passport, he was able to live in China for many years, and concluded that “even if he doesn’t have dual citizenship, he certainly is welcome to be in that country.” This was somehow supposed to justify denying him bail. In the brief, the government also made the absurd assertion that because the defendant had allegedly subscribed to digital media channels of Palestinian resistance groups, he was “receiving almost a constant flow of American and Jewish hate.”
The Justice Department also argued that the defendants’ beliefs are enough to make them a “danger to the community.” Regarding one defendant, the government’s brief claims that “defendant’s steadfast belief that she is supporting a righteous cause and has not done anything wrong is exactly what makes her dangerous.” The brief argues that she should be detained because “no condition or combination of conditions will assure her presence in a court she believes is corrupt, and no condition or combination of conditions will assure the safety of the community that she believes is ‘fascist,’ ‘imperialist,’ and ‘colonialist.’” In other words, having anti-fascist, anti-imperialist, and anti-colonial views is, for the Justice Department, already grounds for being thrown in jail.
So far, the Justice Department’s rhetoric has only partially worked. Judges in Michigan and Illinois have agreed to release the defendants on $10,000 unsecured bond, meaning the courts probably did not accept the state’s assertion that these are dangerous “terrorists” who pose a risk to the community. But the defendants were released on unjust and highly restrictive conditions. The defendants are now subjected to continuous GPS monitoring (for which they have to cover the costs) and confined to the state district in which they live. Some defendants were also given “home detention,” meaning they cannot leave their place of residence except for court-approved purposes, or to attend school or work, and are under a curfew of 8am–8pm. Defendants also had to consent to have their DNA samples collected if asked by the court.
A distraction from the real sources of violence
The presentation of the Michigan Eight as terrorists is intended to distract from the great violence the University of Michigan (UM) and state agencies have used against the Palestine solidarity movement.
University of Michigan police have beaten, pepper sprayed, and groped Palestine solidarity protesters on campus. When UM police violently disbanded the Gaza solidarity encampment in May 2024, at least two protesters had to be hospitalized due to pepper spray exposure. UM has infamously hired private undercover investigators to surveil and harass student activists (and is now facing a lawsuit as a result). There were several instances of UM police investigators making home visits to student activists in order to intimidate them and get information about other individuals in the movement. Public spaces on campus have also been increasingly surveilled and restricted, monitored by police and private security firms.
Top: University of Michigan police pepper spraying a crowd at the Gaza solidarity encampment on campus, May 21, 2024. Bottom: Michigan State Police officer pushing his bicycle into a crowd at a protest outside the University of Michigan Museum of Art, May 3, 2024. UM Regents Sarah Hubbard, Jordan Acker, and Paul Brown were in the museum for an event that day. Protest broke out after the regents refused to come outside to talk with students about divestment. (Photos via TAHRIR Coalition)
The University also brought in heavier state power to try to criminalize the campus movement. UM Board of Regents members Jordan Acker and Mark Bernstein – both major supporters of Israel – recruited their close ally, Michigan State Attorney General Dana Nessel, to pursue felony charges against some encampment participants. Nessel eventually had to drop the charges because they could not be substantiated, at which point UM used internal disciplinary procedures to punish the students. UM police also issued campus bans to tens of individuals who had attended protests. The case against the Michigan Eight is an escalation of this longstanding program of repression.
University of Michigan Deputy Chief of Police Melissa Overton pepper spraying into a crowd (without looking) at an October 7, 2024 rally on campus. (Photo via TAHRIR Coalition)
The case against the Michigan Eight is ultimately about crushing solidarity in all its forms. The U.S. government seeks to criminalize any speech that is supportive of the Palestinian resistance, while trying to break the bonds of solidarity that people in the movement here have created with each other. The Justice Department also wants to send a message: if you damage property to disrupt genocide, you may face decades in prison.
This crackdown is not limited to the U.S. On the day of the hearing for the Michigan Eight, June 12, 2026, a London judge sentenced Palestine Action activists to several years in prison under “terrorism” charges for destroying equipment in a factory that services Elbit, Israel’s largest weapons developer. We must resist this growing wave of criminalization and keep our solidarities strong.
Ways to Support the Michigan Eight
– Donate to the Michigan Eight legal fund.
– For University of Michigan affiliates, sign the open letter of solidarity.
This piece first appeared on Mondoweiss.
