WASHINGTON (JTA) — An Oregon college president and the editors of a campus publication apologized for an article that said students at a nearby school killed all the Jews on campus.
The article, which was intended to be satirical, appeared in The Pamphlette, a student-run humor publication at Reed College in Portland, according to The Associated Press.
Headlined "LC students kill Jewish people," the piece began, "In what is being called a ‘tragic, but all too predictable’ event, the staff of The Leaphlette, a student humor publication at Lewis & Clark College, have been accused of rounding up and gassing all of the Jews on their Portland, OR, campus."
The article went on to say that students asked the chemistry department for a chemical to conduct "Jewsperiments" and that there was now a "towering crematorium" where the library once stood.
Reed President Colin Diver apologized to Lewis & Clark interim President Jane Atkinson and sent an e-mail to the Reed campus stating that the Pamphlette had displayed "a remarkable insensitivity to the deeply held feelings engendered by some of the most horrific and painful episodes of our collective history."
Pamphlette editor Glenn Harrison, 21, a Reed senior, said in an e-mail to The Oregonian newspaper that the article was a response to a piece in Reed’s student newspaper criticizing an earlier Pamphlette spoof of Anne Frank’s diary as enabling "real genocide."
"We found this claim ridiculous, and the real goal of our article was to satirize this notion by driving it to its logical extreme," he said.
The staff has since apologized for being "negligent as editors and members of the community," he said, and "will be exercising more cautious editorial judgment going forward."
Help ensure Jewish news remains accessible to all. Your donation to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency powers the trusted journalism that has connected Jewish communities worldwide for more than 100 years. With your help, JTA can continue to deliver vital news and insights. Donate today.
