Jewish students filed a complaint Wednesday with the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights, alleging that American University, in Washington, D.C., failed to address antisemitism on campus and even punished those who came forward to report the harassment.
The complaint was filed on behalf of a dozen students by the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law and alleges that Jewish students have been targeted by “discrimination, harassment, and intimidation” because of their “ethnic identity and Israeli national origin.” Students reportedly have been “shunned” in the classroom, dorm doors of Jewish students were vandalized with swastikas, one student was allegedly spat on several times and posters of hostages taken by Hamas on Oct. 7 have been torn down repeatedly. (RELATED: Harvard Students Sue Over Alleged Campus Antisemitism)
“This is an egregious case of anti-Semitism that has run rampant on American University’s campus. The university has failed in its legal obligation to protect its Jewish and Israeli students from discrimination and harassment and has instead chosen to retaliate and bully those students who were courageous enough to speak out,” Deena Margolies, the Brandeis Center lawyer overseeing the AU complaint, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Because the administration has been derelict in addressing the anti-Semitism on its campus, it is not surprising that the situation has only worsened and intensified following October 7, necessitating the filing of our complaint with the Office for Civil Rights at the Department of Education.”
Pro-Palestinian supporters march and take over the street near Capitol One Arena, in the Chinatown area of the city on December 17, 2023, in Washington, DC. (Photo by Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images)
The complaint claims that several students, who filmed their peers tearing down posters showing Israeli hostages taken by Hamas, were subjected to disciplinary hearings in November 2023 after reporting the incidents to the school. School officials allegedly claimed that the “students tearing down hostage posters … were merely ‘removing unauthorized postings'” and charged the Jewish students with “harassment and disorderly conduct.”
The Brandeis Center disputes the claim in the complaint, arguing that only some of the posters were in an area the school considered “unauthorized” while the rest were all in “authorized locations.” They also noted that university policy states that only school staff may remove posters, not students and that students who tore down the posters in the “unauthorized” areas then replaced them with their own posters.
“Shamefully AU has repeatedly chosen to turn a blind eye to the anti-Semitism snowballing on its campus,” Kenneth L. Marcus, founder and chairman of the Brandeis Center and former U.S. Assistant Secretary of Education for Civil Rights under the George W. Bush and Donald Trump administrations, said in a press release. “Not only has the university failed in its legal obligation to protect Jewish students from illegal targeting and harassment, it is attempting to bully those brave enough to speak up.”
American University did not immediately respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.
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