Internet Explorer freezing in a function call

I have a JavaScript function that works in other browsers, but not IE 7 or 8. The problem seems to be the line below.

var td_id = $('td[onclick*="\''+tsku+'"]').attr('id');

Using Firebug Lite in Internet Explorer 8, I can run that line of code, and get the expected value. When I run customize(), IE freezes, getting my CPU usage up to 100%. What ideas do you have for getting IE 8 to work with this function?

I updated jQuery to 1.6.1, and that had no apparent effect on this issue.

Tested Browsers:
Firefox 3-5
Chrome
Safari 5 (Win)
Opera 11 (Win and Android)
Internet Explorer 9

function customize(sku) {
    $.ajax({
        type: 'POST', 
        url: '/api.php',
        dataType: 'text',
        data: {
            action: 'get_contents',
            sku: sku
        },
        async: false, 
        success: function(data, msg){
            // data should be a CSV string
            if (is_string(data)) {
                var skus = data.split(',');
                for (var key in skus) {
                    var tsku = skus[key];
                    var td_id = $('td[onclick*="\''+tsku+'"]').attr('id');
                    if (td_id) {
                        var subject = td_id.replace(/_title.+$/, '');
                        var id = td_id.replace(subject+'_title_', '');
                        var selector = 'table_row_'+subject+'_'+id;
                        select_product(tsku, subject, id, selector);
                    } else {
                        td_id = $('a[href*="'+tsku+'"]').parent().parent().attr('id');
                        if (td_id) {
                            var id = td_id.replace(/[a-zA-Z_]+/, '');
                            addToBasket(id, 'Additional', td_id);
                        }
                    }
                }
            }
        }
    });
}

PHP:

Any help is greatly appreciated.

MTS

 

I removed the \' from the line, and IE isn't having issues anymore. It was originally there to find '+SKU within an onclick attribute. The script seems to be working without that part, so I suppose IE just doesn't like having a \' in the code (without a closing one).