A complaint filed with the U.S. Department of Education says the student government association (PSGA) at SUNY Purchase College, part of the State University of New York system, engaged in a campaign of harassment against the campus Hillel chapter, encouraged by administrators.
The StandWithUs Saidoff Legal Department filed a federal Title VI complaint on Tuesday, stating that the school in Westchester County, N.Y., failed to fix a hostile campus environment by ignoring Jewish students’ concerns, refusing to enforce its policies and engaging in unequal treatment compared to other groups.
Current students and recent graduates joined in the complaint.
The filing details how PSGA allegedly shared an image with a student government leader wearing the pro-Palestinian watermelon symbol, attacking Hillel as an “illegitimate club” and engaging in efforts to remove Hillel from campus through selectively applying rules and creating arbitrary new rules.
The complaint also charges that PSGA engaged in the damage and desecration of sacred items by throwing them from a storage locker onto the floor in an attempt to get Hillel to move. The items reportedly included prayer books, candles, kiddush cups and menorahs.
The plaintiffs say SUNY Purchase administrators knew about these intimidations and chose not to take action.
Roz Rothstein, CEO of StandWithUs, told JNS that contrary to previous Title VI complaints that focused on incidents targeting a variety of groups and individuals on campus, this one “highlights a campaign leveled squarely at Hillel—the single center of Jewish life at Purchase—because of its Jewish-Zionist identity.”
Rothstein said that this campaign was launched by the arm of the institution tasked with representing the interests and concerns of students—its student government—and that “the administration refused to correct the PSGA’s discriminatory conduct.”
“Intentionally turning a blind eye from, and at times appearing to openly encourage, the student government’s antisemitic targeting of the SUNY Purchase Jewish community is a clear violation of Title VI,” Yael Lerman, director of the StandWithUs Saidoff Legal Department, said in a release.
Lerman hoped that the Education Department would “intervene to remedy this deeply troubling violation of the rights of Jewish, Israeli and Zionist students, and to prevent these students from being subjected to such hostile treatment in the school year ahead.”
In a statement provided to JNS, Milagros Peña, president of Purchase College, said that the school “remains steadfast in our commitment to providing a safe and hate-free environment where there is zero tolerance for bias, hatred or discrimination.”
“We reject antisemitism. We stand firmly against any discrimination or marginalization of any group of students or individual students in clubs or other organizations,” Peña stated. “We are committed to being welcoming and inclusive to students, faculty and staff of all religions, ethnicities, backgrounds, races, identities and viewpoints.”
“As the semester is starting, the campus is continuing mandatory training in Title VI, which started this spring, and will be working to ensure all campus community members are aware of how to report any incidents of bias that they witness or experience, so that it can be thoroughly investigated and addressed,” Peña added.
