Campus Watch January 18, 2024

Lawsuit: Harvard Accused of “Double Standard” In How It Handles Antisemitism

A group of Jewish students filed a lawsuit against Harvard University on Jan. 10 accusing the university of engaging in a “double standard” with how it treats antisemitism compared to other forms of discrimination.

The New York Post reported that the lawsuit alleges that the university “permits students and faculty to advocate, without consequence, the murder of Jews, and the destruction of Israel, the only Jewish country in the world. Meanwhile, Harvard requires students to take a training class that warns that they will be disciplined if they engage in ‘sizeism,’ ‘fatphobia,’ ‘racism,’ ‘transphobia’ or other disfavored behavior.” The suit also claims that Harvard did nothing when a Jewish student was surrounded by pro-Palestinian protesters chanting “shame” at him and that Jewish students have hide in university buildings during pro-Palestinian protests. 

A spokesperson for the university told Axios that the university does not comment on pending litigation.

Education Dept. to Investigate Brown 

The Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights (OCR) is launching a Title VI investigation against Brown University over allegations that that are pro-Israel students are being “targeted and threatened” on campus, Fox News reported on Jan. 10.

The complaint was filed by Dr. Zachary Marschall, the editor-in-chief of the conservative website Campus Reform; a spokesperson for the university told Fox News that OCR made it clear that they were simply “fact-finding” and have not made a determination on the merit of the allegations. “We remain resolved in our cross-campus efforts to ensure a community where all individuals feel safe and valued and where no instance of antisemitism, Islamophobia or bias based on religious, cultural or ethnic differences is tolerated.”

MIT Computer Science Lecturer Quits Over Campus Antisemitism

Mauricio Karchmer, a computer science lecturer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), announced in a Jan. 9 piece in The Free Press that he is quitting his “dream job” due to “the pervasive antisemitism on MIT’s campus.”

Karchmer explained in The Free Press that the university was unable to condemn the Oct. 7 massacre and instead issued a statement “riddled with equivocations, without mentioning the barbarity of Hamas’s attack.” And the congressional hearing in which MIT President Dr. Sally Kornbluth said that it would depend “on the context” if calls for genocide against Jews violated university policy. The final straw was when he realized that one of his former teaching assistants “was one of the organizers of the Coalition Against Apartheid and helped bring Mohammed El-Kurd to campus.” He handed in his resignation on Dec. 13.

“My letter stated, in part: ‘I cannot continue teaching Algorithms to those who lack the most basic critical thinking skills or emotional intelligence. Nor can I teach those who condemn my Jewish identity or my support for Israel’s right to exist in peace with its neighbors,’” Karchmer wrote. “My boss asked me to reconsider. But my mind was already made up.”

Report: HS Principal Approved, Lauded “Shut It Down for Palestine” Walkout 

Emails obtained by The Daily Wire reportedly show that the principal of a high school in Maryland approved and expressed pride in an anti-Israel walkout that was held on the anniversary of Kristallnacht.

Edward Owusu, principal of Clarksburg High School in Montgomery County, purportedly responded to an email notifying him of the protest by stating: “I am proud that the Muslim Student Association has made a collective decision of support. Please make plans to see Mr. Haynes regarding plans for the Walk Out.” The assistant principal, David Douglass, also reportedly informed the Muslim Student Association of the protest’s approval and that the school would be providing equipment for them to use.

MLA Passes Motion to Protect Anti-Israel Faculty, Students

The Modern Language Association (MLA), the country’s most respected group for language and literature scholars, passed a motion calling on the organization to protect university faculty, staff and students who denounce Israel’s “massive bombardment of the Gaza Strip” as well as faculty who believe that the ongoing war “must be viewed in the context of the Palestinian Nakba of 1948, Israel’s 56-year-long illegal occupation of the West Bank, and Israel’s 16-year long land, sea, and air blockade of the Gaza Strip.”

The College Fix reported that a separate motion calling for the protection of all faculty members regardless of their viewpoints on the conflict was voted down overwhelmingly. University of Illinois-Champaign Professor Cary Nelson, who co-authored the motion that was voted down, told The College Fix: “With this vote, the MLA allies itself decisively with anti-Zionism. Worse still, by considering Jewish students unworthy of equal protection, it crosses the line into antisemitism.”