Several Jewish students have filed a lawsuit against Harvard University, accusing it of becoming “a bastion of rampant anti-Jewish hatred and harassment”.
The lawsuit filed earlier this week mirrors others submitted since the 7 October Hamas attack on southern Israel, including legal action against the Art Institute of Chicago, New York University and the University of Pennsylvania.
In the Harvard lawsuit, the plaintiffs include members of the Students Against Antisemitism. They accuse Harvard of violating Jewish students’ civil rights and allege that the university tolerated Jewish students being harassed, assaulted and intimidated – behavior that has intensified since the 7 October mass killing.
The Hamas attack sparked a huge military response from Israel, which continues to bombard Gaza, killing more than 24,000 Palestinians, in a bid to, as the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has pledged, “destroy Hamas”, the Iran-backed, Islamist controlling group of Gaza.
“Mobs of pro-Hamas students and faculty have marched by the hundreds through Harvard’s campus, shouting vile antisemitic slogans and calling for death to Jews and Israel,” according to the lawsuit. “Those mobs have occupied buildings, classrooms, libraries, student lounges, plazas, and study halls, often for days or weeks at a time, promoting violence against Jews.”
It was unclear what the mention of mobs in the lawsuit refers to, but the university has been rattled by protests since the 7 October attack. At one point, pro-Palestinian students occupied a campus building for 24 hours.
Marc Kasowitz, a partner at the law firm that brought the suit, Kasowitz Benson Torres, said in a statement that the litigation was necessary because Harvard would not “correct its deep-seated antisemitism problem voluntarily”.
A spokesperson for Harvard said the school does not comment on pending litigation. About a dozen students are potentially facing disciplinary charges for violations of protest rules related to pro-Palestinian activities, but the spokesperson said the school could not comment on their cases.
Fallout from the Israel-Hamas war has roiled campuses across the US and reignited a debate over free speech. College leaders have struggled to define the line where political speech crosses into harassment and discrimination, with Jewish and Arab students raising concerns that their schools are doing too little to protect them.
The issue took center stage in December when the presidents of Harvard, Penn and MIT testified at a congressional hearing on campus antisemitism. Asked by Republican lawmakers whether calls for the genocide of Jews would violate campus policies, the presidents offered lawyerly answers and declined to say unequivocally that it was prohibited speech.
Their answers prompted weeks of backlash from donors and alumni, leading to the resignation of Liz Magill at Penn and Claudine Gay at Harvard.
The US Department of Education has repeatedly warned colleges that they are required to fight antisemitism and Islamophobia on their campuses or risk losing federal money.
The Associated Press contributed reporting
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