Numerous lawsuits related to campus antisemitism against American institutions of higher learning are pending in jurisdictions throughout the United States, some brought by the U.S. Department of Justice. One of them, filed on May 26 by the DOJ against the Regents of the University of California, specifically relates to alleged discrimination and harassment of Jewish students at UCLA.
Other private lawsuits throughout the state have been filed by parents of primary, middle and high school students. One of them involves the parents of a Jewish high school student in San Leandro, Calif. This East Bay teenager’s parents sued her principal, two former teachers and her school district in April, alleging “pervasive and unrelenting” antisemitic harassment and discrimination over two years, leading to panic attacks and a precipitous drop in their daughter’s grade-point average.
The lawsuit alleges that in the classroom, teachers backed students who expressed support for Hamas, and who disparaged Jewish people and the State of Israel while promoting and participating in pro-Palestinian walkouts. The plaintiff in the lawsuit further alleges in her complaint that classmates “demanded she answer for her entire people, wielded ‘Zionist’ as a slur and held her personally responsible for ‘genocide’—all because she is Jewish.” She said “peers with whom she had maintained long-standing relationships dating back to elementary school terminated their friendships with her.”
In addition to the actions described in the complaint, students in the district engaged in pro-Palestinian walkouts and expressed support for Palestine, leading to a hostile environment where Jewish students faced severe antisemitic harassment, bullying and hostility, with no reaction or support for these Jewish students from teachers and administrators.
In recent memory, the term “lawfare” has entered the popular lexicon, as has the word “weaponization.” It seems that these two terms are casually thrown about to describe various behaviors and actions, and have taken on derogatory meanings.
On May 18, The Jewish News of Northern California published an opinion piece written by Laura Einhorn titled “Antisemitism lawsuits against school districts do more harm than good.”
Einhorn is a public-school teacher in San Leandro, the very same district that is the defendant in the above-described lawsuit. Whether or not there is a direct or dotted line between the pending lawsuit and her opinion piece, it is clear that Einhorn reaches the wrong conclusion by suggesting that legal action against school districts is inherently harmful or somehow contrary to Jewish values. Her article calls to mind the advice given to residents of Skokie, Ill., in 1977 when neo-Nazis sought a permit to march in the town in the United States most heavily populated by Holocaust survivors: “Close your curtains, stay inside, and the trouble will pass.”
Lawsuits have not been the first resort for most Jewish parents. They are the last resort after repeated complaints, meetings and requests for intervention fail to produce meaningful action. When Jewish students are subjected to harassment, intimidation, exclusion or discriminatory treatment, schools have both a moral and legal obligation to respond. If they do not, families have every right to seek legal remedies—just as any other protected minority group would.
Einhorn’s characterization of these lawsuits as “lawfare,” intended to silence criticism of Israel, ignores a critical distinction between protected political speech and conduct that creates a hostile educational environment for Jewish students. Criticism of Israeli government policies is protected speech. Harassing Jewish students, targeting them because of their Jewish identity, glorifying violence against Jews or permitting classrooms to become openly hostile spaces is not.
The claims made in this lawsuit have been repeated in multiple school districts throughout California. Jewish students have been mocked, isolated, intimidated or subjected to antisemitic imagery and rhetoric without adequate intervention by teachers and administrators. Teachers who seek to indoctrinate rather than educate need to be identified, called out and made subject to discipline. If school administrators are not willing to do this, then the only recourse left to Jewish parents is through the judicial system.
Einhorn singles out legal action by Jews, yet one must ask her if lawsuits alleging racism or discrimination against other minority groups, including African-Americans, Asians, Muslims or members of the LGBTQ community, would also fall under her rubric of “lawfare”? Why don’t Jewish students deserve the same protections afforded to every other minority group?
Nor is it persuasive to argue that legal action reinforces stereotypes about Jewish power or influence. Civil-rights litigation has long been an essential tool for vulnerable minorities seeking equal treatment under the law. Jews should not be discouraged from asserting their legal rights out of fear that antisemites may weaponize old tropes.
The answer to antisemitic stereotypes is to reject the stereotypes—not to abandon lawful efforts to protect students.
