Was hate the motive for attack on girl wearing hijab at west suburban Chicago school?
GLENDALE HEIGHTS, Ill. (CBS) -- Calls have been mounting for a hate crime investigation after a student was attacked at her west suburban school.
Several videos show the seventh grader being attacked last week, and a prominent local Islamic organization says it appears to be hate-related. Video recorded in between classes shows a boy attacking the girl.
The school said it was a horrible case of bullying, but others insist this was a targeted hate crime.
In the video, a seventh-grade girl is cornered by the lockers at Glenside Middle School in Glendale Heights – when a boy comes and puts her into a chokehold before slamming her to the floor.
There is no audio in the clip. Yet, there are multiple camera angles taken from various students that capture the attack at the school.
"And what's also very disturbing is that you see these other students that are filming the whole thing - and they're not intervening," said Maggie Slavin of the Council on American-Islamic Relations Chicago.
Slavin said the boys targeted the girl because she was wearing a hijab at school.
"We see a targeted attack towards a hijabi-wearing student," said Slavin.
For that reason, CAIR Chicago has called for Queen Bee 16 School District in Glendale Heights to treat this incident as more than a school scuffle – and instead to treat it as a hate incident.
"We would like some swift action on this matter because this girl deserves justice," said Slavin.
The district launched an investigation immediately following the incident last Thursday.
On Monday, Supt. Joseph R. Williams told CBS 2, "We have no evidence at this time to lead us to believe that this attack was motivated by racial, cultural, or religious intolerance."
Williams said the attack was intolerable and unacceptable, adding. "[W]e are taking steps to ensure that the students responsible for this incident are held fully accountable to the limit of all relevant laws."
Yet since the start of the Hamas-Israel war, CAIR-Chicago said they have received at least 200 complaints of school-age attacks.
"And the fact this is happening toward students of this age indicates to us that there is hatred, and there is bias that's being spread inside of homes; inside of communities," said Slavin.
While the school investigation concluded, police were also contacted. There was no word Monday night where that probe stood.
